A Shine Like Gold
by seventhe
Summary: Her entire life was spent striving for absolute perfection. Now prodigal Quistis is hit with a new string of challenges, chances, and choices. Can the brilliant blond continue to shine like gold?
1. The Height of Experience

_One: experience's height_

  
  
  
  


She had always been too tall.

Looking back on life, in those small dull moments between responsibility and responsibility, had become a hobby for her; occasionally she was more than curious as to what it was that had made her - who she was. There was plenty of tragedy in her past, enough tragedy to shape a woman into what she was today. But that wasn't it. There had been many people who had shared the same hardships - there had been six of them in that orphanage alone - and yet no one had turned out quite like she had.

She had pinned it on the fact that she had been too tall.

As a child she was a giant - tall and thin, but never gangly - always graceful and poised, as if to avoid calling forth any additional attention. But the height gave her away; combined with her shining crown of golden hair, she had been unignorable. She stood a good head above all of her comrades: a little girl she was not. Even the boys had to look up at her. And she was forced, at that young age, to look down to them.

And it rubbed off. Spending childhood having people look up at you - no matter how literally or figuratively - rubs off. Childhood is that one time where honesty has a real, viable meaning; and appearances are so important. So this little not-little girl, the tallest of them all, had tried to become an older sister, using the height to what she thought was an advantage of sorts. It was as if she at some point had realized that the height had a meaning; and from that day her entire life was a struggle to live up to the extra height she had been given. She had decided that if she had to be so tall, she'd be _tall,_ dammit, and make something out of it.

It hadn't exactly worked at that point. The towering five-year-old Quistis hadn't been able to pass her older-sister act off on any of them. But when she left the orphanage - that safe haven where everyone had known exactly what she was - she moved into more dangerous settings, where no one knew exactly what she was, and it was here that the height had helped her.

It had become a way of life. Even now she stood at five-foot-six: tall enough for a woman to look a man in the eye. She didn't tower over everyone like when she was a child, but there was still a lift, an extra boost - the height of experience. Prestige, rumor, legend: they were the high heels she wore, lifting herself once again over the heads of everyone else. Still crowned with that golden hair. She _had_ made something of the height, though she was no longer striving to be an older sister; she was a leader, a teacher, an authority.

Her height had helped her as an Instructor, true - the fact that she had that extra bit of height in her walk, no matter how imaginary it was. She had looked out at the students and realized that they were all looking _up_ at her; looking up in a familiar way, one she had seen her whole life. It helped her earn the prestige she never would have gotten any other way; it disguised the fact that she had not been much older than the students she was meant to teach. Somehow she had been able to keep that small edge of authority - the habit of looking _down_ at everyone even if she had to look up - at times when she thought everything was lost. 

Ask any student in the Garden about Quistis Trepe and they'd spout the same set of words. A genius; I hear she's super smart; insanely talented. Youngest SeeD, youngest Instructor. Cool and collected. Ice Queen. She's a genius. Wicked hot, too. Prim, proper, practical. Blond and beautiful. Detached. Never lets emotion get involved. A brilliant phenomenon. She has quite a gift. Isn't she some sort of child prodigy? Ideal soldier. Smart. I heard she aced her Instructorship. Perfect. Perfect. _Perfect._

It was the height speaking, Quistis knew; and part of her wanted to scream, to confess, to collapse and crumble. She'd always been so tall, and the height had driven her to make something of herself. She had to be perfect because people said she was perfect, and she was an unforgiving judge. But all the images were just a collection of standards that she always felt she had to hold herself to. It had been a challenge of a sort when she was younger, trying to make her outer image match with the image people held in their minds. 

It had certainly helped her get where she was today. Cleverness, yes; perhaps intelligence; and good old-fashioned determination. 

But she still both blamed and credited the height of her childhood.

She sat in her old office sipping rich coffee and staring about herself. The walls had been covered in a very systematic fashion with photos, newspaper clippings, souvenirs. Her office held no clutter; it was full, yes, but she knew the placement and order of every artifact and token on her walls. They were all gifts from friends and admiring students - as congratulations, perhaps, or thank-yous, or something else. These photos and articles formed a publicity record of the Sorceress Wars. A timetable graced her walls, one to which only she understood the real order and meaning.

Time is a plaything; she had learnt that on their travels, and in tribute to the great lesson she had scattered these memorials over the four sides of her office.

Not that she enjoyed many memories of the war. No one likes to remember war; it's the time everyone wishes would fade into memory - the actions we are now ashamed of, no matter how moved we were at the time. War is a funny mechanism in everyday life; an enemy is declared, sometimes arbitrarily and sometimes not, and a goal is defined. The normal people line themselves up behind the soldiers and the speakers and the singers and declare themselves a general cheering squad. That definite enemy and goal create a sort of unison: a binding force, perhaps, between forces not used to being bound.

And then the war is over, and everyone suddenly realizes that the other side is, in fact, human; and all are ashamed of what everybody did and said and didn't do and didn't say. Especially in Garden, she thought: especially SeeD. Every SeeD started out as a real person with a real life: and that very often grants both superhuman strength and terrifying weakness.

She laughed to herself, thinking: I sound so bitter and cynical again. But I can't help it, I've been this way my whole life; and I doubt it's going to change any time soon, thank you very much.

But she was bitter and cynical for a reason. There were reasons out there, she knew. The world was driven by reason: reason and rules. Cause and effect. Underlying each and every action lies the force which drives it. And each action has an equal and opposite reaction.

She had lived her life by that: scientific boundaries. Logic was her weapon, the undeniable force of the truth a guide she looked for. Grit and determination paired with a fantastically quick mind - a mind that, no matter what, could detach itself from reality and _think_ - that was Quistis Trepe.

That and her height - the undeniable height of experience.

Quistis stood, pacing slowly forward from her old desk to look out her old window. It was panic, she mused, that made her feel like this; restless, unsettled. Her thoughts tended to dwell in the past rather than the present mess she found herself in. Her eyes glanced over the familiar pattern of the pictures on the wall, the words she no longer had to read, for they were burnt into her mind.

Time is a plaything - for some.

She bent her head, closing her eyes, thinking back into the past. Remembering. Calling forth memories, fighting against the presence and pressure of the Guardian Forces, sifting through them with her scientific mind - trying to determine when the tides had turned. Searching.

Cause and effect, action and reaction. What force brought her here?

After the War ended - the War with a Capital W, the Sorceress War in its second incarnation - after the War ended everyone had returned to Balamb. They clung to each other like some sort of nightmarish creature, and yet no one would admit it. Balamb was home for everyone because everyone was there. It was as simple as that.

Everyone slept for about a week straight. She remembered poor Kadowaki, throwing well-kempt hysterics, thinking that the saviors of the world had all been stricken with the Time Kompression Flu or something; but they were simply exhausted. They received hasty room visits from doctors and Headmasters and officials and occasionally SeeD cadets and news reporters who slipped past the vigilant guard. It took them about a week - that long, dark, in-between week - to realize that these room visits meant they had been given _rooms_. And thus Balamb Garden became an _official_ home - for the time being. 

After they woke up from the week-long nap they found that someone had decided to throw a party. "A party," complained Quistis to her new roommate Selphie. "We just got back from the bloody _future_, from a Sorceress who likes to muck around with our foster mother and Squall's girlfriend - and they think we want to go to a _party_? Here we are, recovering from Time Compression - a week ago we were wandering around, trying with all we've got to remember each other and pull together - and someone thinks it would be a good idea to get us together with some chips and dip and some shitty music in the Balamb Garden Quad?"

Selphie innocently shook her head, deciding not to tell her new roommate that she was excited about the party and would be bringing her new video camera.

Selphie had understood about human nature, much more than Quistis ever had - and still more than Quistis understood, even now. She had realized that after a horrible time like that when the world isn't really sure what just happened; after monsters have been pouring down on the earth from the moon; after Sorceresses Awoke and Gardens Flew; and, for one brief and horrible moment, time _did not exist_ - after occurrences such as these, people like to just get together under the pretense of confirming that they are all, in fact, alive. People gather around somewhere and look each other in the face, relieved by the fact that things have perhaps returned to something that could be called normal. People revel in the fact that everyone is safe (safe being a relative term, of course) and do stupid things like steal other people's cowboy hats and choke on hot dogs _just because they can_.

Lesson one. People take comfort in the company of other people. Something she'd never understood, for she'd never had anyone else's company to enjoy. Quistis Trepe had always worked best alone ...until now.

Gritting her teeth, Quistis turned back to her desk.

They had all applied for Instructorship together, she remembered - well, _all_ being herself, Zell, and Selphie. Squall had been swallowed in the surprising amount of administration work left over from the War, being Balamb's Commander; Rinoa had been swallowed by publicity and controversy, being that she was the first Sorceress in the history of the world to apply for SeeD candidacy. And Irvine - well, that cowboy hadn't yet decided whether or not he'd settle or wander.

Quistis couldn't help but chuckle, remembering: Irvine hadn't decided who, if anyone, wanted him around. The memory was sweet, however: she knew that poor Irvine had finally figured out where he belonged. He and Selphie, joined at the hip, the way it had been all those years ago in the stone house on the beach - that story, at least, had a happy ending. Just like Squall and Rinoa's story promised to end. Like her story would not. Could not.

Headmaster Cid had actually _offered_ them all Instructorship, Quistis remembered, clenching a fist at the memory. _Offered_ it. Knowing that the experience they had gathered during that War with its Capital W had made them quite possibly the most qualified SeeDs on the planet. Knowing that Balamb Garden couldn't let this prestige and authority slip through its proverbial fingers. Perhaps feeling a little bit of guilt and sympathy for the children he and his wife had raised so long ago - for the terribly tough trials fate had thrown at them.

_Offered_ it. As if he hadn't swiped it out of her hands less than a year previous. As if he hadn't shattered her life by revoking her _first_ license. Offered it as if he were offering a truce, or a gift. It had almost felt like an insult.

She had refused to take the gift, wanting to _earn_ her reinstatement, even though she knew that the exam was a bitch and the trial active demonstration was graded very harshly; and Selphie and Zell had followed her lead, to her chagrin (and private relief). The three of them had studied and trained and applied together; and together, they _owned _that exam.

It had been so much easier the second time, dammit. She knew that they had all gathered immense amounts of experience on all of their travels - but it made her feel as if time had in fact been correct, as if everyone who had told her so was laughing in her face.

Perhaps she _had_ been too young to take on Instructorship the first time?

She didn't like thinking that. It made her feel strange, being wrong in such a major way. It ran along the line of regret. And Quistis Trepe didn't believe in regret.

She hadn't been a bad Instructor, she knew, and she wasn't a bad Instructor now. She had just always taken the job too seriously. And back then there had been the additional ingredient of the forgotten pasts. Seifer and Squall had stirred the pot a little too much; she had never understood why they never really respected her authority over them, or why she just couldn't bring herself to crack the whip on their asses and dunk them in the detention tank. It had been quite a shocker when she finally remembered everything - when, fueled by Irvine's revelation, her mind had opened up that box and she had been presented with golden-crowned Quisty, tall as trees, trying to be everyone's older sister and not getting away with it.

Seifer and Squall - they had known. She wasn't as tall as she presented herself to be. They hadn't been fooled by experience's height - though they hadn't known why either. Just as they hadn't remembered why they kept spurring each other on, always competing, trying to be on top.

The second time around had been much easier. She'd been put directly into the upper-level classes, teaching the hardcore Junction Theory labs and Limit Break Development studies. Stuff she never would have trusted herself to teach; but again the height of experience came through, and she found that she _could_ teach it, and teach it fairly competently as well. She almost enjoyed the job. It was a lot of work, but she had always liked being a leader. She liked to know that she could have some sort of effect on _something_ - that she could affect a life or two for the better. She could make sure that things were done _right_.

And she would've stayed in that vein forever - content as anything - if it hadn't been for Squall.

Quistis sighed. It hadn't been his fault; and he surely had given her an opportunity that she hadn't even dreamed of. But between Squall and Cid - always two of her greatest weak points, brother and father, two strings on her heart - her fate had been sealed. It was as simple as an equation: their idea plus her ambitions of perfection equaled one perfect opportunity, one undeniable goal - and one sorry mess.

That's where it was, she realized, and sighed. That was the point where everything started to change. That one mission - the mission of a lifetime, the chance of a thousand dreams. That damn mission. The promise. Action and reaction. And now I'm fucked.

Her height had, for once, fooled even Squall into thinking she was tall enough. Tall enough to make this choice - this sacrifice, for it was a sacrifice, at least now. No one had known it would be quite so hard; but even Cid had thought that she was tall enough to make it all come together.

But Quistis knew better. She had never admitted it, even to herself; but she did now. She wasn't really tall. She wasn't. It was an air she carried, the shine of perfection, a shine like gold; reflecting the light around her, like her bronzed hair. But she wasn't tall, she wasn't made of gold; and, dammit, she wanted people to stop treating her as if she were.

It all came back to that mission: her last mission. The mission where - although she had won through in the end, she had been successful - her height had failed her.

It's not that she hadn't been good enough - she'd won. The mission, at least. But Quistis felt trapped now. Her brilliant mind, as everyone else referred to it, had faltered. She'd won the mission, but lost the war - her own war. And for once in her life, she couldn't think of a way out.

  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  


* * *

__Yo. 

_Sorry about the delay. Life has - quite literally - turned me upside down, dropped me, and then jumped around on me for a while. Frankly I haven't been in the mood for fanfiction: my mind has been elsewhere. A lot. But I think finally that a little writing and a little imagination will be good for me. _

_I like Quistis. Always have. Although I don't like a lot of what they do to her in the game, which is funny. I always kind of related to her - the blond with the glasses and the brains who was always just a little more mature than everyone around her. I'm a lot like her, and I can relate to a lot of her story. This will end up being a little bit about me, too - except that I don't have the sweet magic powers and the whip._

_This story is pretty much all planned out, and the beginning, at least, has been written. However, in the interest of my own sanity, I'm going to try to keep updates on a bi-weekly basis. I apologize for those of you who went through the frenzy that was 'sincerity cowboy'. I just can't do that right now XP_

_Oh, and this _does_ happen in the same storyverse as 'sincerity cowboy'. I suggest reading it before you read this. A shameless plug if I ever saw one, but it may come in handy._

_Hope you enjoy. _

  
  



	2. The Scream of a Challenge

**Chapter Two**

The Scream of a Challenge

  
  
  
  


Quistis stood in the window of her old office, eyes closed, soaking in the sun as it came through her window. It was lunchtime. She normally took the hour to get ahead on her grading and planning, eating a quick meal at her desk as she worked. But today for some reason she was feeling particularly lazy. She had been standing here in the sun for the past ten minutes, absorbing the rays as if she were some cold-blooded lizard depending on its heat for survival.

It had been a long week. Not only had the rhythm of her own lessons picked up - she was expected to have a class of higher-level SeeDs ready for their Rank 16 certification test by next Thursday - but there were strange things brewing. Talk of subterfuge and other traitorous deeds was circulating among the students and faculty, fueled by strange rumors of missions gone awry. Galbadia Garden was facing scrutiny and examination. And on top of it, Selphie and Irvine had left on an impromptu mission, leaving her and Zell with extra classes and extra work.

"They're eloping," Zell had said with excitement. "I'm sure of it."

"You're an idiot," Quistis returned acidly, less than thrilled with the extra responsibilities. "They're not eloping. It's an official undercover mission."

"I don't believe you," Zell stated. "Betcha they come back married."

"What are you willing to bet?" Rinoa asked, intrigued.

"It doesn't matter," Quistis said, sighing. "Mission or elopement or trip to Hyne's Green Heaven, it doesn't matter. We still get their papers and their classes. And that sucks."

"Isn't Hyne's Green Heaven that bar down in Deling?" Rinoa mused.

Yes, it had been a trying time. 

The past week had been a gritty sort of stressful hell for her. And for some reason, standing in this spot of sun was quite bloody relaxing. Maybe, like that cold-blooded lizard, she could turn some of this heat into extra energy and actually make it through until her certifications were done. Or at least until the end of the day; she'd be content with that.

There was a knock on the door.

"Aw, hell," she muttered under her breath, her eyes fluttering. "Come in."

Zell Dincht walked in, carrying a stack of papers which looked suspiciously like the ones currently sitting on her desk. "Hey, Q," he warbled, "I have a present for you."

"I think I hate your present," Quistis said ruefully. "More finals?"

Zell stuck out his tongue. "What else? They were in Selphie's lesson plan for today."

"I have to grade?" Quistis asked wearily, knowing the answer already. She turned back to the window, begging the sun on her face for just a little bit of energy.

"It's your week," Zell said. "I teach, you grade. And we get to do this until those little buggers get back from their honeymoon."

"It's a mission, Zell."

"Bah." He bounced on the ground, swinging a couple punches through the air. "You sunning yourself or something?"

"I'm _tired,_ Zell." Quistis turned around and gave him a smile. "It's like a nap."

"A nap." Bounce. "On your feet. With your eyes open." Bounce, and a punch. "You don't know how to nap, do you, Q?"

"Oh, I know how. Trust me." She headed towards the desk, paging through Selphie's exams. "But tell me - when do I have time for a nap?"

"After those," Zell said with a wicked grin. She reached out to swat him, but he jumped away nimbly. "Try some coffee."

"Oh," Quistis laughed, "I'm pretty much immune to that. The magical powers of coffee vanished years ago, Z."

"You still drink it," he pointed out, lunging for a mug on her desk.

"I like the way it tastes," she stated, snatching the mug out of the way before Zell's well-placed swing could connect. His grab ended up catching air; Zell pouted, his blond spikes sinking down to tickle his forehead.

Quistis couldn't help but laugh. There had been a time when she'd been convinced that Zell Dincht was - well, _simple._ But then she'd seen on their travels, throughout the entire ordeal with Matron, that both his brains and his heart were where they belonged. Zell was simply open and honest with what he was thinking and feeling - no matter how insightful, or how dumb. And he could be both in the course of five minutes.

"Get out of here," she said with a grin, waving at the door. "I'll take care of these. Give 'em to you at dinner?"

Zell stopped bouncing long enough to throw her a look. "You won't be done by dinner, Q. That's Selphie's final."

"Ex-actly." Quistis allowed herself a satisfied smirk. "First of all, they're entry-level cadets. Second of all: it's Selphie."

"Heh." Zell chuckled. "You just wait until you read that. Selphie's not an idiot, Q."

"Oh, I know, I know," she replied cheerfully, throwing her hands up in submission. "Selphie's about as bright as they come, I know that. But it's _Selphie._ I can't imagine her being mean to a fly."

"She's a jerk," Zell chanted, "she's a big jerk. The kids can't decide whether they love her or hate her."

"Hmm." Quistis paged through the exam, murmuring to herself: it actually looked like a decent challenge, and she was surprised that her soft-hearted Trabian friend had created something this vicious for entry-level cadets. Selphie was smart, yes, but her desire to have the entire world's love and affection was overwhelming at times. She looked up at Zell, shrugging. "Okay, it's harder than I thought it would be. But I'll still have it done by dinner."

"You don't have to," Zell said. "Why bother? Relax, Q."

Quistis relaxed into her chair, opening a drawer in search of her favorite grading pen. "Because direct, immediate feedback promotes learning," she said, scanning the drawer; like the rest of her office, it was a mess to everyone's eyes but her own. "The sooner they get the exams back, the more likely they'll be able to remember _why_ they made the mistakes they did. And knowing why produces changes." She brandished the newly-found pen at Zell. "Reasons produce results. Cause and effect, Zell. Best way to influence learning."

"Best way to influence a hernia," Zell returned, grinning, "for you _and_ the kids. They'll crap flowers if they get those back tomorrow."

Quistis gave an evil chuckle. "Another benefit."

Zell rolled his eyes. "You're cleaning it up if they do. Catch you at dinner."

Quistis cleared a space on her desk to work, then headed into the faculty lounge to refill her precious coffee mug. She sat down with the exams, reading over the first handful to get herself acquainted with the level of the students and Selphie's style of exam. Then she began grading, one part of her mind entirely focused on the questions and her comments, another analyzing the questions and the exam as a whole. A third part idly wondered how easy it would be to move her desk into the sunlight.

This division of thought had always been one of her best skills. It was simply the way she naturally thought; part of her mind spent its time detached from everything, analyzing the given information in the way it saw fit. Neither danger nor emotion could stir this part of the mind into a response, earning Quistis a reputation as 'cold' and 'indifferent'. 

She didn't feel that she was really either; it was simply a _skill._

In the depths of ferocious battle, it allowed her to examine her enemies, taking mental notes until she could reproduce their attacks. In the depths of ferocious politics, it allowed her to drive to the heart of a problem, often ignoring sensitivity. It wasn't a personality trait, or even a personality flaw; it was a _tool_, one she used well.

She worked through the afternoon, her respect for both Selphie's final and Selphie's students growing as she continued through the exams. No one had taken the petite Trabian Instructor seriously, she knew; Selphie was at _best_ hard to take seriously. But this exam was serious, and hopefully after they received their results, the students would be serious as well. Dinnertime came; Quistis continued to work, knowing she'd miss the first round down in the cafeteria. Oh well. Three rounds of dinner were served at Balamb; and there were always late-night hot dogs.

Finally she finished up the last one, just in time for the second call. She stacked them neatly on her desk, her grading log on top; checking the clock, she decided to run the final grades up to Cid's office before he left. It was protocol for Instructors anyway, but Quistis knew he'd appreciate the good news; most students had done relatively well on the final. She locked her door and headed to the elevator.

As the doors opened on the third floor, Quistis paused instinctively. Something was wrong - her ears perked. She could hear two heated voices from behind Cid's door. But even as her fists clenched in reflex, her spine relaxed; she recognized one voice as Cid's. And the other voice...

...was Squall Leonhart? Yelling?

Oh dear, Quistis thought. Should I leave? I don't want to overhear something I shouldn't, that's not only against protocol, it's _rude_. But as much as she tried, the shock of the yelling voices had her rooted to the ground.

"...I won't do it. I don't want it. I never wanted it." Even Squall's voice was cold in fury, avoiding the usual fires of passion and anger. "You can find somebody else, because I won't do it."

"But you're the only one -"

"No, I'm not. Start looking into qualifications; I have." There was a loud bang that Quistis - uncomfortably - pictured as an unfavorable reaction between Squall's fist and Cid's desk. "I have a couple ideas if you want to talk. Otherwise, this is over."

Quistis, shocked at Squall's tone of voice and ultimate irreverence for the Headmaster of Balamb, could only stare as Squall threw the door open, left, and slammed it behind him. She opened her mouth to make an excuse, but Squall (not even bothering to question her presence) growled, "Stuff it, Trepe," and got in the elevator.

Quistis knocked on the now-shut door. "Sir?" she asked, her voice steady as usual, even as her mind churned. "It's Instructor Trepe."

Cid opened the door, trying his hardest to not look frazzled; Quistis, respecting his privacy, tried her hardest not to notice. "Instructor Tilmitt's grades for her first final," she offered, holding out the paper as an offering of peace.

A small smile cracked Cid's concentration (he had to concentrate very hard on not blowing up with frustration, she knew; she'd heard about his many run-ins with NORG). "Ah, yes," he said, relaxing visibly. "Let's see."

He took the piece of paper and paced over to his window, scanning it. "Norfest and Becker in this class?" he asked absently. "And Norfest passed - barely. Interesting. Becker sure didn't."

"Sir?"

He turned to her, re-noticing her presence and smiling. "Sorry. Two of Garden's biggest troublemakers are in this class here. I'm trying to keep an eye on them - without our old Disciplinary Committee, it's not easy to keep the bullies in check."

Quistis's mind raced. Alan Norfest's exam had been close to miserable; she would've failed him if it hadn't been for Gor Becker's attempt. "They don't seem bright enough to be real trouble, sir," she offered.

Cid chuckled. "Perhaps," he said. "But they won't be happy about this. Will you alert Instructor Dincht to be on the lookout for trouble tomorrow?"

"Of course, sir," she said with a nod, returning his smile.

Cid and Quistis had always shared a strange sort of relationship. Cid had been the closest Quistis ever came to a father figure; ever since she came to Balamb Garden, seeking order and refuge from the chaos that had been her foster family. Cid had taken her under his wing, seeing not only her intelligence and bright disposition but her sheer determination. Later, when Quistis remembered the past, she knew that Cid had been acting out of fatherly instinct - caring for all the children who had once played at his orphanage. Somehow she had never begrudged him, never been angry with him for withholding the truth about the past. 

Although she had been angry with him. The awkwardness of a loving father dealing with his prodigal daughter surfaced when they remembered that they were Headmaster and Instructor, Commander and Soldier - Chief of Garden and lowly SeeD. Cid gave orders, and Quistis had to obey them. That had strained the relationship, but never broken it; although the day Quistis lost her licence had come very close.

Now Cid smiled at her, the light returning to his eyes as if he had just realized something. Quistis smiled back, the tension dissipating again. She could see Cid relaxing, looking at her as if he had finally recognized her. "That copy is yours, sir," she said finally, her empty stomach getting the better of her.

"Yes," he said, looking down at the paper. "I'll file it right away."

As she turned to leave the office, Headmaster Cid said suddenly: "Quistis."

She turned at the sound of her real name. The Headmaster was always careful to use titles - Commander, Instructor, Cadet - during operational hours; names were too personal, too emotional, too much attachment and not enough distance. "Yes?" she asked, almost hesitant.

"Can you meet with me tomorrow to discuss a couple important issues?"

Oh. The detached part of her brain produced her schedule before the rest of her had processed the question. "I'm scheduled until third block - thirteen-thirty," she heard herself say. "I should be free after then."

"Alright then," Cid said, giving a brick nod. "We'll have an appointment at fourteen-hundred hours, then."

"Yes, sir," she said automatically, her curiosity screaming.

"Good. Thank you, Instructor," he said, turning back to his desk; again automatically she saluted and left the office. 

Not Quistis: Instructor. It's probably just another damn mission, she thought as she headed to the cafeteria. Some lousy pain-in-the-ass mission that Squall refuses to go on. Lucky me, getting Leonhart's hand-me-downs. Soon I'll be wearing his old jacket, too, with a pin that says Commander-In-Training. Maybe he'll lend me a belt if I'm really nice; Hyne knows he has enough. Chuckling to herself, Quistis grabbed a salad and a sandwich and took them upstairs. 

She spent the rest of the evening in her room, working on lesson plans and tomorrow's assignments (although she did have to slip into the library after hours to look something up in _Coulter's Handbook of Magic-Based Statistics._ Luckily Zell's pigtailed girlfriend had given her the late-night access code; three after-midnight visits from a panicked Quistis had convinced Ambrosia to give up the seven digit code and guarantee herself a good night's sleep. It was usually _Coulter's Handbook_, too; neither she nor Selphie owned a copy, a fact that somehow tended to slip Quistis's mind until 2 AM. Some nights when it got obscenely late she wondered if the library would ever suspect her - Instructor Trepe - of stealing their copy of the massive reference, because stealing it was a tempting thought). Selphie was gone on a mission, so the room was peaceful and quiet and almost lonely; she finished up her lab work for tomorrow and went to sleep in a good mood.

  
  


The next day dawned happily, a bright sun flashing over the Balamb plains in an instant. Quistis was awake, as always, two minutes before her alarm: a combination of her training and her independence. There was no way she could be late - and if that meant she couldn't depend on a small electronic contraption, so be it. She always awoke before the alarm, although often she stayed in bed, relishing the extra couple minutes of restful not-sleep that her habit afforded her. Her internal clock was set to perfection. And yet, throughout her entire career, she had always set the clock anyway. She certainly believed in backup. Nothing was dependable.

Quistis left nothing to fate.

Her day always started the same way: stretching. She had been mocked, teased, laughed at, and (once Selphie became her roommate) had pillows thrown at her; and yet, every morning, she began with the same ritualistic set of stretches. "The types of days I have," she had once joked bitterly, "you need to start off stretching, or you'll be sore at the end." Most of the jokes died down when the stretches became the sort of acrobatic feats only yoga masters (and Zell, occasionally) were capable of. The wake-up exercise then became a blistering set of sit-ups and crunches which propelled Quistis into the shower while whatever audience she had sat with their eyes wide.

Not like she always had an audience in the mornings, she mused with a laugh. Never in that way. It had always been missions, or Xu, or Selphie. Never anyone that might have been worth skipping the routine for.

She donned the crisp SeeD uniform, pulling her wet hair out from beneath the jacket; she felt it land between her shoulderblades with a wet _thump_. A quick breakfast bar and a cup of coffee (she, of course, had a timer on her coffeepot as well); gathering papers and references as she deftly pinned the shining wet hair atop her head. A sigh as she looked around the room; her morning routine had always left her feeling perked and strong. But it wasn't any use this semester: the most dismal of all morning classes had squashed the feeling flat.

Junction Lab. She remembered disliking it in her _own_ years of training.

This morning, the students (all SeeD ranked between ten and fifteen) were working in pairs, testing out the effects of a speed junction. Quistis had supplied various sets of magic spells to each pair; a single spell was junctioned to one's speed and the effects were tested in a simple hand-to-hand joust with one's partner. Quistis had found that the students liked the hands-on training exercises much more than the boring theory reports - obviously - and had geared her class as such. Though that meant her lab reports were just that much harder. This particular one promised to be a bitch both to write _and_ to grade.

She paced the room, examining the sets of lab partners and their particular techniques. Most of her students were good, intelligent cadets who worked hard in their classes; upwards of level ten this sort of dedication was necessary. Quistis had offered bonus points to students who could correctly rank the spells in order of effectiveness before the end of the period; she wondered idly how many would get it right. It was hard to do, especially with such a subjective test as hand-to-hand combat. But it was a real-life application, one that Quistis liked and approved of. 

The disconnected part of her mind was curious about her mission - for she had no doubt that she'd get talked into taking it, perhaps with a SeeD rank as a reward, or maybe just for some extra cash and the week off. She wondered why Squall had been so adamant about avoiding it; her mind began to come up with awful scenarios, which only amused her. Maybe Cid was going to send her off to Doctor Odine for experiments - that would be horrible. Maybe she had to kidnap someone - Laguna, perhaps, or even Rinoa's father, General Caraway. Kidnapping might be fun. Or maybe she'd have to dig up Seifer Almasy and drag his rotten ass back to Garden. She laughed in spite of herself. 

The pair of students she had been observing looked at her, startled; both of them wondered what had been so funny about their Blizzaga Junction that had made their straight-faced Instructor laugh.

She continued to chuckle, sending the students back to their practice with a wave of her hand. Bitter and cynical again, she thought. Seifer Almasy indeed.

She met Zell for lunch as usual; luckily, they were both on time for the first lunch bell, because Norfest and Becker decided to throw a fight. The two bullies had cornered a couple of entry-level cadets who had happened to score higher on Selphie's exam than they had, intending to even things out with their fists. Zell saw it first and dove into the fight - it was actually an impressive string of handsprings which ended in a dive - and by the time he had separated the bullies and their prey Quistis had her whip about both of their ankles, sending them to the floor. 

Norfest and Becker were scolded very soundly in front of the cafeteria and sent to speak with Headmaster Cid about serving detention - "And don't think I won't notice if you don't go up there," Zell said, his voice very dark and authoritative. "I'll be looking for you in detention."

Becker said nothing; Norfest growled something unintelligible and spat on the floor.

With a flick of her wrist, Quistis snapped her whip in his face, a mere space away from where his tongue had been. "Listen up, Norfest," she said, her voice as chilly as her eyes as the boy turned to look at her, startled into momentary obedience. "March on up there, or I'll double what Cid gives you."

No one doubted this strong, tall woman with ice in her eyes and fire on her lips. Norfest and Becker scrambled to their feet and - with a momentary glance at Quistis's whip - headed toward the stairs.

Zell set about putting the cafeteria to rights. Quistis calmed the younger cadets (ignoring their looks of admiration) and, realizing she was now out of time for lunch, grabbed a tray and headed up to her classroom.

The second of her classes - Limit Break Development - more than made up for the dreary morning Lab. The students loved it - it was the one place in the Garden where they were all _unique._ Quistis had found that no matter how carefully you picked a weapon - even nunchucks - someone else out there would use it. But Limit Breaks? These were _personal._

Most of the time the class was a seminar; students sat casually around the classroom, leading discussions on rage channeling, panic and desperation moves, the power of adrenaline. Other days Quistis led them to the Training Center, where they fanned out in groups of three and practiced their moves one-by-one, each student letting his physical well-being drop slowly until bit-by-bit that fantastic power built inside them.

She had found that students were terribly creative on their own - sometimes too creative for their own good, when an imagined move backfired - and most of the time all they needed was some gentle, intelligent prodding. Quistis wasn't very good with the gentle part yet, but she could usually nudge a student in the right direction. Today the lesson passed quickly and with little mishap, which pleased Quistis; this was a rare event indeed. She cut the students' homework in half as a reward, which pleased them in return. 

  
  


Two o'clock came and she found herself outside of Cid's office, surprisingly resigned. She realized that she wasn't looking forward to another mission, and then realized with a small shock that it had never really occurred to her that she might say no. This thought was so surprising to her that she didn't have time to reconcile with the realization before the door opened; a little "Oh!" escaped her mouth, and Cid chuckled.

"Hello, Instructor."

Quistis quickly regained her composure and smiled. "Hello, Headmaster. Sorry, I'm a little distracted - you were right, Norfest and Becker threw one in the cafeteria today."

"Those two," Cid said, shaking his head. "I almost miss the Disciplinary Committee - they always did their job, you know."

Quistis tactfully refrained from saying, But they were bullies; she managed to nod. Seifer, Fujin, and Raijin _had_ managed to get the job done in a way.

"So," Cid said, sitting down at his desk (Quistis noticed that he had attempted to clear it off. She also noticed that Squall's desk was vacant) and gesturing to the chair across from it. "Have a seat, Quistis."

She sat down, a smile playing on her lips. Her real name - again. Cid was slipping in his old age. "What can I do for you, Headmaster?"

Cid opened his mouth, closed it, and then gave a little laugh at his own nervousness and awkwardness. "Well, Quistis," he said. "I have an interesting situation in front of me and an interesting decision to make." He paused there, and Quistis found herself thinking anxiously: is he asking me for _advice? _Oh dear.

Cid, smiling, clasped his hands together on the table as if he had just come to a decision. "I'll just ask you plain out, then: Have you ever given any thought to becoming a Headmaster?"

Quistis's hands dropped to her lap; she blinked, more in surprise than anything. "Excuse me?" she asked faintly, though both of them knew that she had heard and understood. Her mind was racing: A Headmaster? Me? The thought had never even occurred to her - which was almost as surprising as the proposal itself.

"No, sir," she managed to say, gathering her wits. "Not really."

"I see." An odd look flittered across Cid's face, and Quistis suddenly recognized fatherly disappointment. "I'm rather surprised, my dear; what with your natural talents, you are an ideal candidate for the job. You've always been a natural leader, you know."

The small detached part of Quistis's mind had recovered from the shock; she heard herself say, "Thank you, sir - but I thought Squall was lined up for the job - you know, as Commander, sir."

"Ah." Cid folded his hands neatly on the desk. "Well, as Commander, Leonhart was obviously the first person asked about the position. But Squall has - declined the offer. He has no desire to move upward in the command chain; in fact, he has requested to step down as Commander as well." He blinked, and then smiled. "Squall feels that the job should go to someone with skill, instead of someone who was forced into a leadership position he didn't want. He was the one who suggested I ask you."

The phrase _Leonhart's hand-me-downs_ trickled across her consciousness; a small wave of rage swelled behind Quistis's eyes. But she was intrigued - the intellectual part of her had seized control, and she was curious. So this is what Squall meant, part of her mind thought rather hazily.

"May I ask - why is there a need for another Headmaster, sir? Do you mean here - at Balamb?"

Cid paused, and then sighed. "I'm stepping down, Quistis," he said softly. "After everything that happened over the past few months, I think it's for the best. I'm tired of this job, and I - I want to just take care of my Edea and let everything blow over." He momentarily covered his eyes with his hand, and Quistis caught a brief glimpse of a heavy exhaustion. In that instant she realized what Cid must have gone through - his wife, under the control of an evil Sorceress, and his command possibly the one that sentenced her to death; his Garden, flying across the landscape; his children, off to face the ultimate danger. Quistis felt nothing but a daughter's pity for this gentle and caring man; she wanted no more than to reach across the desk and take his hands and say, I am with you. But the desk was in the way: that divider that separated Headmaster from SeeD. She remained still.

Cid recovered himself gracefully, smiling almost apologetically, and Quistis briefly wondered if he had ever let himself go like this in front of Squall (and if Squall would have told his Headmaster to go talk to a wall as he had once told his Instructor). "Truth is, I can't step down as soon as I'd like," he continued almost casually. "But I've begun looking for a suitable candidate - and I'd like to offer you the position, if you're interested."

Oh my, Quistis thought. Interested? Of course I'm interested; who wouldn't be? But I bet there's a catch. "What would it entail, sir?"

Cid smiled. "Well, there is a preliminary qualification, but it's no harder than the Instructorship exam. Your past records will be checked, which shouldn't serve to be a problem. The most important part, however, will be your field exam."

"Field exam?" Quistis's ears perked.

"Yes. You'll be given a mission, much like entry-level SeeD cadets." He chuckled. "Except that yours will be harder, of course - much harder. And you'll be expected to complete it individually. The field exam is like a test of your capabilities as a SeeD as well as your loyalty to Garden. Every Headmaster had to complete one - they're usually deadly hard, some mind-boggling challenge that no one thinks is possible. It won't be easy, Quistis, but I'm sure you can do it."

"The field exams usually take the larger part of a year," he continued, and Quistis blanched. A year? Out on mission for a year? By myself? What sort of a test is this? And, much more quietly: What if I fail?

"...and Garden will support you financially during the mission's duration. It's standard procedure." Cid noticed that she had fallen a bit behind. "I'm sorry to throw this all on you, Instructor," he said kindly. "It's just that - there's a mission in the offering, right now. The Garden Council has proposed it as a Headmaster's Qualification; they know of my intentions, and when it came to ground it was an obvious course of action."

"What sort of mission?" Quistis asked tentatively.

Cid carefully opened the single scarlet folder resting on his desk. "You know that Selphie Tilmitt and Irvine Kinneas are currently out on mission, correct?" She nodded briskly. "Kinneas discovered a potential leak within Garden - a subterfuge, if you will, working from the inside to undermine our authority and image. Not to mention potentially costing the lives of hundreds of cadets."

Quistis nodded; Irvine had told her about the mission before he and Selphie left. She worked on remembering the details while listening to Cid.

"Tilmitt and Kinneas are currently in-field agents acting to catch the SeeDs responsible for the leak. But much of the Garden Council believes that the treachery goes much deeper. They want to send an investigator out to find who is behind all of this - someone who can look through both Garden and civilian evidence and find the source of these problems. Of course, we'll be waiting for the results of the Tilmitt-Kinneas mission, but if they turn out like we think they will ... it's one hell of a mission, Instructor, and one hell of an opportunity."

Cid's expressive gruffness was unusual, and Quistis looked up suddenly. The old man cared so much for his Garden; she found herself echoing his feelings of anger at people who would strike out against an institution designed to protect. She opened her mouth, but suddenly found herself at a lack of words to say.

Cid saw the hesitant motion and turned back into the gentle father she knew. "Think this over, Quistis," he said. "I'm very proud to be in the position to offer this to you, and I think you'd make us all proud by accepting. However, I don't want to force you." He reached across the desk and took her hand, startling her; he had echoed the very gesture she had wanted to make not so long ago. "There'll be a meeting of the Garden Council tomorrow afternoon, in the grandroom of the Balamb Hotel. If you wish to accept, you will need to be there; it will begin at fifteen hundred. If not -" He paused. "If not, we will discuss other candidates during the meeting."

Quistis gave a brisk nod, trying to keep her mind from spinning. "Yes, sir. Thank you."

Cid smiled at her. "No need to be so formal now," he said gently. "Not all the time."

Surprised, Quistis felt her lips turn up slightly. "Habit, sir. I mean it - thank you."

She was glad that the rest of her day was empty (or as empty as a day with a stack of lab reports large enough to hide a Grat could be), for her brain wasn't quite working the way it should be. It was so much like a movie she had watched once: Your mission, if you choose to accept it ... she laughed to herself, almost giddily, and went to get more coffee, thinking wildly that perhaps that would help. Maybe she should bring this up with Squall, she thought, and then laughed again, definitely giddy this time. Commander Talk-To-A-Wall Leonhart wouldn't be able to give her any good advice. She should probably go anyway; make his ego feel better, since apparently it had been his idea to suggest her. But she'd learned not to let Squall have so much control over her heart.

Headmaster?

A chance - a chance and a choice. Something to make a difference. To be in control. She _was_ Quistis Trepe: one of Garden's original prodigies. Youngest SeeD, and Youngest Instructor: they hung over her head like plaques. And now she'd been offered this chance. This choice. She'd worked for it - indirectly; but some small part of her knew she had always been undervalued, even here at Garden. Somehow she was something special, someone a little taller than the rest. And here it was - the chance. Reasons producing results, cause and effect, just like she had told Zell this morning.

And yet ...

Part of her heart was shaking wildly. It was the part that held all of her fears, her insecurities, her emotions. It was the box in which she had locked her childhood the day she came to the orphanage. The part which shook and doubted and wept when Quistis herself could not. The part that lost itself in rage and hatred when Quistis had to be calm. The part that drowned in dreams and love while Quistis kept herself apart. It had only been opened, briefly, twice in her life: once when she lost her Instructor's License. And once on a basketball court in Trabia when she had looked deep within herself.

She had learned over the years to ignore it - trained herself, like any good soldier, to dismiss the threat. And, like the good soldier she had turned out to be, she had excelled at it. Being able to step forward when no one else could had held her in good stead. The box had become a fortress for things like fear and doubt and love and weakness.

But it was shaking, slightly, within her now. Knowing that this was duly the choice of a lifetime. A life-changing decision. Something that would permanently alter her life. Taking the mission would lead her down a dangerous path into new territory. Refusing it would leave her comfortable, where she was - but with that vague hint of regret.

There were so many what-ifs.

She was content with her life now, yes. Not ecstatically happy, but Quistis had come to believe that that sort of extreme and powerful happiness only came to certain people. Selphie and Rinoa had it in spades. But people like herself - and Squall, now that she thought about it - simply continued in their life, not consumed by their cheerful passions, but not complaining, either.

She thought back over her day, then broadened it, scanning her past weeks at Garden. Teaching classes, attending classes of her own, her days calm and unremarkable and full of simple little joys like an accident-free day in Limit Break Dev and simple little troubles like Norfest and Becker. A life on track. She'd worked for her Instructorship and now she was where she was, high marks and all, and proud to be there. Not the fiery pride she'd felt when Ultimecia had met her end, but a soft and simple pride, nonetheless...

Anyway. Happy and content, yes. Did she really want to leave? To risk everything? Abandon teaching, abandon her friends at Garden? Walk out one day - for she was sure that she wouldn't be able to tell anyone - and then come back Headmaster? It would change everything. Forever. No more living and teaching with Selphie and Zell. Her life would be her work. This was a large step, and it was a step away ...

Wait. Quistis hastily backpedaled her thoughts - another advantage of that small, detached portion of her mind - and scanned them over. She seized on the feeling of regret. If she turned this down, would she regret it? Would the rest of her life be colored by a decision to say no? Would she look back in five, ten years and wonder: what if?

Yes. _Yes._

She would regret not taking this chance. 

Hands shaking, Quistis set the empty cup down, wondering when exactly she had finished the coffee.

  
  
  
  
  
  


_Again: Sorry this took so long. Life just doesn't calm down when you want it to; and confusions induce writers-block._

_It's funny. I have always felt that Quistis is much like me - and now, the story I have planned for her has become my story as well. I was offered an amazing and yet terrifying opportunity of my own, and (although I don't have to complete a mission) I find that most of the feelings I'm writing for Quistis are my own. Who knows - maybe the story will change as my own life changes. I wasn't planning on being _this_ true-to-life, but now that the parallel is there, I can't help but indulge it._

_Anyway. Hopefully another chapter within the week. I do appreciate reviews._

  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  



	3. The Pieces of a Puzzle

_hey guys - wrote this in a different program (stupid MSWord) so if anyone gets formatting problems, please leave it in your review. It's a pet peeve of mine, and I'm sorry if it happens. Will try to fix._

Chapter Three

the pieces of a puzzle

            The town of Balamb was always a cheerful place, full of splashes of life: water upon beach, sun upon stone.  This day was much like any other: beautiful, but not overwhelming; calm and peaceful, like most of Balamb was.  Sunlight dripped from the buildings, gracefully falling from smooth, well-worn wood and stone onto the passers-by.  Waves gently hissed up and down the shoreline as a soft soundtrack to the dance of the falling sunbeams.

            Quistis Trepe stood in front of the Balamb Hotel.  Dressed in her SeeD uniform – spotless and neatly pressed as usual – she looked tall and professional, almost regal.  She was early.  She was ten steps away from the door.

            She was trying to gather her courage, or her wits.  Either would be acceptable; she could deal with losing one, but both had currently gone to lunch and they were sorely missed.  

            The night had been long and mostly sleepless.  As she had expected, she had been unable to sleep, turning the possibilities over and over in her head.  Scenarios presented themselves; emotions crept out of their hiding place and wrung themselves around her heart.  She had told herself sternly to get her sleep because she'd need it tomorrow; and her head had firmly told her to _get bent_ and continued to dance around with predicaments and possibilities.

            All her life Quistis had used a simple strategy with her big decisions.  If she was truly torn between two things and was unable to decide … she simply chose a solution and went to sleep.  The ideas turned themselves over in her head while she slept away, oblivious.  When she woke up in the morning, she always knew if her decision had been wrong – she could tell; something in her bones, or her heart, or her head told her she needed to go in another direction.  If she woke up in the morning and felt good about the decision – well, obviously, she moved on.  The habit had never failed her.

            However, it _did_ require a sound sleep.  Something that had eluded her.

            At four in the morning she decided to hell with this, I'm awake and I'm going to do something productive with myself.  She got up, made tea, and graded a set of lab reports that weren't due for a week.  She did an extra-long workout.  She read ahead in the text she was thinking of assigning for Limit Break Dev.  And she still wasn't tired.

            The decision was still as elusive as ever.  Six-thirty came and went, and the day began.

            In desperation, Quistis headed to her office.  She'd do some organizing, perhaps.  Let the thoughts simmer in the back of her head while she filed papers and reorganized her pen collection.  She was as fidgety as a puppy, and resented herself for it.  What was so hard about accepting this amazing opportunity?  She'd have to work for it, yes, but she had never shirked a job.  Ever.  Could she find the confidence in herself to just take it?  What if she messed up?  What if she failed?

            What if she gave up now?  What sort of person was she?

            She blinked into her pencil drawer, unable to focus her eyes.  She _could_ do it, she had been _asked_ to do it, it had been _offered_ to her.  Other people had faith.

            Why couldn't she?

            Back to the pencils.

            In the midst of her half-hearted attempts at distraction, there was a knock at the door.  She jumped, and then cursed loudly, and then laughed at herself.  Finally she called out to invite the guest in.

            She had been expecting a student, coming to complain about an assignment or to appeal a grade on Selphie's final.  The last person she had expected to see was Squall Leonhart.  She would've been less surprised had it been the hot-dog lady.

            The Commander of Balamb Garden stood outside her door, looking just as surprised with himself as Quistis felt.  She almost had to laugh at the look on his face, thinking, Rinoa put you up to this, didn't she.  She'd invited him in, gesturing to the chairs that stood along her wall.

            "Go ahead and pull one up, Commander," she said, slamming her pen drawer closed a little harder than she had expected.  For a second her heart had flared up with hope – Squall knew her, he could talk to her, give her advice on what to do and what she was good at –

            And then her brain had caught up with her heart and given it a good solid slap.  This was Commander Squall Talk-To-A-Wall Leonhart (her brain chuckled, because that rhymed) and he would be no help whatsoever.  

            Quistis and Squall had found it hard to get along.  True, they had never been best friends.  But the awkwardness of their interwoven histories – and Quistis's self-proclaimed _misunderstood love_ – stood between them.  There was too much past between them that wasn't past.  The awkwardness of their positions in relationship to each other didn't help, either.  Squall was still Commander, a position he loathed and yet had been handed freely.  And Quistis had fought her way back to Instructorship, a position she loved and yet had been denied.  Neither of them took well to authority from each other; they both remembered that not long ago they had been Instructor and Student.  And not long before that they had been two small lonely children, one tall and one small.

            Overall it was a mess which manifested itself in large amounts of awkwardness.  Quistis was too bitter and cynical to think that she and Squall could be friends now; and Squall was too stubborn and cold to let anyone save ethereal Rinoa behind his wall.

            Squall sighed, and that look appeared on his face again, the one that said he was really surprised to be here; and Quistis began to think in spite of herself that perhaps Rinoa hadn't sent him at all.

            "I hear you've been offered a wonderful opportunity," he began formally.

            Damn, Quistis thought, unsure of how to treat the opening.  Working with your friends is a problem – is this an official visit from the Commander?  "I've been offered a mission and a reward," she began, her head spinning.

            "I suggested you," Squall said simply, and the sentence was so unexpected that even Quistis was caught off-guard.

            "Yes, Headmaster Cid said so," she replied awkwardly.  Um.  Was he expecting a thank-you card?  A pat on the back?  A cookie?

            He shifted in his chair as if he had just had the same thought and didn't want any of Quistis's gratitude (or her cookies).  "Are you going to take it?"

            She paused again, and said truthfully:  "I'm not sure yet."

            "Really."

            She looked up at him and blurted out:  "What do you think?"

            And suddenly they were children again, one tall golden-crowned girl who wanted to be the older sister but couldn't do it without the approval of the others - especially the one small dark-haired boy who only wanted the other sister, wouldn't accept her - 

            Squall blinked in surprise, and then shifted in his chair again, and then very nearly smiled.  "Do I think you should do it?  Or do I think you _can_ do it?"

            Very slowly,  she nodded, knowing that a part of her very much wanted to hear his answer.  "Either.  Or both."

            "Of course," he said then, the tone of his voice plainly telling her, I wouldn't have suggested you otherwise.

            They sat, looking at each other almost awkwardly.

"Wow," she said finally, smiling slightly.  "A two-word pep talk from the Commander."

Surprisingly, Squall answered her smile with a small one of his own.  "At least I didn't tell you to talk to a wall."

Her smile broadened in response.  "Well," she said, "that would have been four words.  Hyne forbid."

He raised one eyebrow.  "I wanted to tell you," he said quietly but solidly, "that you'd have my support."

The warm golden feeling of encouragement and approval had slowly sunk through her then.  She had the confidence of Cid and Squall – the men that had perhaps played the most important roles in her life up to now – and it was like a force that had settled in her bones and her heart.  It was the greatest compliment she had ever been paid.  Quistis felt tall again.

It was on that strength that she had walked to the Balamb Hotel.  But at the sight of those doors the strength had dissipated and even the thought of having Squall on her side couldn't call up that golden force again.  Ten steps away from the door, and Quistis had again paused, listening to that small voice quaking in her heart.  It was a disembodied voice, whispering little phrases that sapped her self-confidence.  Quistis tried to conjure another voice, someone who would tell her something _encouraging_…

"Quistis, the meeting is inside the hotel, not out here in the street."

This new voice was so familiar and welcome that Quistis smiled in spite of herself, allowing it to drown out the voice of her doubts.  Of course.  Xu would be here early – she was Special Commander, Rank A, and in charge of all kinds of defense.  She'd do a full perimeter check before Garden Security even showed their faces.  And then she'd set the table while everyone else thought they were doing their job.  Xu was an amazing woman, and Quistis was suddenly struck with the exciting idea of making Xu her Commander.  Giddily she turned around to smile at her best friend.

"You're a twit," Xu said, but affectionately.  "Are you really not that sure of yourself?"

Quistis sighed, and finally the last of her doubt allowed itself to be tucked away into the corners of her brain (where it would certainly plague her later, she knew).  She had never even thought of going to Xu – which she certainly should have.  Xu had been older sister and teacher and guardian all in one.  She and Quistis had immediately bonded in their classes (Quistis had tested out of many of her first- and second-year courses) and had been inseparable through all their training.  Xu was an orphan as well, and her foster-family life had been much like Quistis's; the two girls found soulmates in each other.

But for all their similarities, they were very different people.  Xu had wanted to get in the field immediately, while Quistis had always been oriented towards Instructorship.  Xu would never be interested in being a Headmaster, Quistis knew.

What an idiot she had been.  Giving Xu a small smile that said, you're-right-I-am-a-twit, she gestured to let the older girl lead her in.  "You have to set the table, right?"

Xu's small snort was the perfect response.  Her extra security measures were the best-kept secret in all of Garden; 'setting the table' had always been the code phrase for 'securing the area', and both girls knew it.

With Xu at her side and both Cid and Squall behind her, Quistis took those last ten steps and entered the Balamb Hotel.

The mahogany table of the Balamb Hotel grandroom - home of many integral SeeD conferences – was old and worn by years of use.  The edges of the table had long since been unevenly smoothed by the constant play of fingers brushing its surface.  Dents and scars – it had many – spotted and streaked its surface; but even these had been worn down, no longer sharp but smoothed by the passage of time.  Quistis sat, tapping her own fingers against a particularly attractive knot in the wood, wondering if the force which had sanded this table had been – not time, but an overwhelming sense of boredom, which drove idle fingers to prattle away at the mahogany itself.

The meeting hadn't started yet, which accounted for the boredom.  They were waiting for the delegation from Trabia Garden, and Headmaster Martine had decided to regale the entire room with one of his stories from FH.  Martine – though he could be a wonderful Headmaster – was quite possibly the world's worst storyteller.  For what seemed like the umpteenth time Quistis folded her hands neatly in her lap, determined to stop fidgeting.

_Being a Headmaster will mean putting up with Martine's stories._

She bit her lip to keep from groaning.  Her eyes flickered upwards to scan the room again; all sets of eyes instantly averted themselves (save Martine, who was thoroughly engrossed in telling his story to the table).

This would not do.  Everyone was watching her.  She'd have to behave.

The doors opened, and Xu approached, her stride long and proud, her portable communicator in one hand.  "I've received conformation that the Trabian portion will not be joining us today," she said, the appropriate hint of regret present in her voice.  "They had a minor earthquake which resulted in more damage.  Headmaster Shain sends his regrets and will meet with each of you at his earliest convenience; but there was no way for him to get away.  One of their dormitories suffered some damages."

"Man needs to get his priorities straight," cracked a man that Quistis knew as a financeer; he sat between the Shumis and a light-haired man that looked to be one of Martine's.

"His priorities _are_ straight," Cid replied kindly.  "He's a Headmaster, and a dedicated one at that."

"Poor Trabia," Martine commented.  "With all their reconstruction troubles, it might be worth thinking about simply constructing another Garden elsewhere."

"Scrapping Trabia?" asked Xu.  "They'd never stand for it – least of all Headmaster Shain."

"True," mused a chestnut-haired woman at the other end of the table.  "Shain's stubborn as get-out.  But it's a question of opportunity cost…"

Quistis listened to the banter; it sounded light and idle, though it was anything but.   Around the table sat various members of what Cid had called the Garden Council – a committee consisting of representatives from each of the Three Gardens and their funding interests.  The Balamb party consisted of Cid, Xu, and Squall (who had been silent the whole time and appeared to be as bored as she) along with their Shumi investors.  Galbadia had sent Martine and his Commander, a man called Era Maxus, along with the chestnut-haired woman; some of the financeers at the other end beside the Shumi could be assumed to be theirs as well.  There were three empty seats which Quistis guessed had been designated for the Trabian entourage.  The finance people and the lawyers rounded out the other end of the table, as if they knew that their presence was not exactly cheered for.

Cid introduced her, presenting her to the Garden Council as the candidate for Headmastership for Balamb Garden.  He handed a folder to Headmaster Martine and passed another down to the end of the table – her credentials, she assumed.  

"As you all know," Cid continued, "Garden standard protocol prevents any headmaster from being under the age of twenty-five.  Instructor Trepe is nineteen.  However, I believe the issue can be dealt with later.  Her mission could take anywhere up to a year, and after that she will undergo the obligatory two-year internship.  The Garden Council has recently made exceptions to some of the more stringent rules, and I am hoping that we can consider the option of making another."

"Cid, those decisions were under extreme circumstances," said one of the lawyers.  "We can examine your case, but I don't think that a desire for early retirement constitutes an early appointment."

"I know, Karya," Cid said to the dark-haired woman.  "We can examine such details when the time comes."  He smiled.  "I'm not asking for them to be reviewed now.  I'd rather focus on Instructor Trepe's upcoming mission objectives."

"Ah, yes."  Martine looked at his Commander, who produced a thin manila folder.  "Mission briefing."  Maxus handed the folder to Squall, who placed it atop his similar folder and handed it to Quistis.

She didn't get a chance to open it, because Cid stood up and began to pace in front of the room; she recognized his usual mission-briefing mannerism and remained still.  "As everyone in this room is aware, we believe there is a traitor within our midst.  Someone at Garden has committed various acts of subterfuge in the hopes of destroying both our resources and our credibility.  The mission in question involves tracking down those responsible and dealing with all persons in question."

He looked at Quistis, who had the wherewithal to ask:  "Isn't there a mission out already tracing down the perpetrators?"

Cid nodded.  "Yes.  However, Special Commander Xu has just returned from Deling City, where she and her team conducted a full search."  He opened his mouth as if to continue, and then gestured for Xu to give her report to the Council.

Xu stood up, tucking dark silky hair behind one ear – three earrings twinkled – and began her report.  "My team managed to trace the sources outside of Garden protocol.  We were forced to abandon the trace in order to act on the Kinneas-Tilmitt mission, which took priority as ordered.  The details found are included in that folder."  She gestured at Quistis.  "What we found implies that the funding for these – acts of subterfuge – comes from an external source.  There's something larger at hand here."  She grinned, and Quistis noted the informal way she addressed the council; very different than Cid.  "We had to act on other orders, but I've got a hunch."

Maxus nodded.  "In the Galbadia folder, I've included all the traces I did on the two students who are suspect.  Maybe some of the information will match up."

"Instructor Trepe, your mission will be to move within and outside Garden to find the people responsible for these acts of subterfuge.  I don't mean the cadets involved – we're looking at them – we want you to trace this to its roots.  Find out who is behind this and why.  Act upon it if necessary.  We want this stopped, and we want it stopped now."

Cid's voice was much more forceful than Quistis remembered, and she looked up at him with respect in her eyes.  "Yes, sir," she said, hoping her voice would be strong; it was.

"We expect you to act to the best of your ability in all situations.  Obedience to Garden protocol will be expected at all times.  You are also expected to act on your own, although an emergency channel for a backup request will be made available to you."

Quistis nodded.  "Yes, sir," she said.  She knew the truth as well as the rest of them: Quistis Trepe worked best alone.

"You will be given free rein of Garden information services," Martine said, "as well as lodging at any Garden.  We will cover your travel expenses within reason."

"Yeah, no executive suites, Quis," Xu cracked.

Martine, to her surprise, smiled.  "Probably not.  You will receive a Garden Account card.  We'll review the expenses before processing, and anything deemed inappropriate will be charged to your wages as SeeD.  Everything else will be taken care of through our general mission funding."

"How will that work?" asked one of the financiers, a balding man with a low-pitched voice.  "Are we expecting any sort of revenue from this mission?"

"Aren't SeeD missions meant to bring _in_ cash, not spend it?" asked another.

Cid turned to them.  "This mission is vital to the very survival of Garden," he said, his voice darkening.  "It will be funded _by_ Garden – we are commissioning these actions.  If expenses get out of range, we will have to rethink things.  But this – this is a threat that must be taken care of."

"Oh dear," said the first businessman.  "We'll have to rethink our budget."

"We can talk later," Martine offered, in an attempt to shut the man up.

Cid turned back to Quistis.  "The rest of your mission details are in that folder," he said.  "If you have questions, I ask that you come only to myself or Martine – or Headmaster Shain, once you have met him.  Please keep the details of your actions entirely under secrecy."

Quistis nodded.

Well, wasn't this hell in a handbasket.  A mission as vague as, "Find the guys responsible and take care of them"?  The mission would take the good part of a year, her ass.  She was beginning to think she'd be lucky to be done with it before she was twenty-five.

Then again, maybe she'd be lucky.  Maybe it was just some random twit with a grudge, and she'd be done.

Somehow she doubted it.  Her gut was telling her that the rumors were right – that Xu was right – that Selphie and Irvine were going to be right.   There was something nasty behind this all.

The meeting flew after that.  Cid finished all the necessary arrangements with the finance folk while Martine and Maxus decided to send word to Trabia.  Xu appointed herself in charge of finding Quistis "all the fun gadgets you'll ever need."  Squall looked at her, gave her a small smile, and left.

Quistis walked out with Cid.  The silence between them was comfortable – not perfect, but close.  Cid looked at her and smiled.

"Best of luck, Quistis," he offered.

She smiled back at him.  "Thank you, sir – Cid."

***********

_Ah.  Another long span of time, another chapter (even though nothing super happened, there's some important information and stuff).  _

_It's been busy.  Life's crappy, you know?  I've always supported the whole idea of 'if life gives you lemons, at least you'll have something to throw at people'.  I know a couple people I'd like to peg with a lemon, if only a proverbial lemon._

_This chapter was written and posted almost entirely from my bed.  Way to go wireless apartment!  I know, I'm a nerd – but haw haw!  I'm in bed right now and you're (probably) not!!_

_ I appreciate the feedback:_

_Noacat (thanks so much … and keep writing Angel Wings!); Masked Reviewer (can I call you MR?) - (you stuck around for most of SC, I'll try not to disappoint; "what could have Squall running? Power." – HAHAHAHA.  Way too true, and you've hit on an important part of the story!); nynaeve77 (glad you stuck around for this one!); chococat2 (thanks, and I'll be sure to continue); xahra/kate (as if I need to explain Quistis to you ^^; and I agree about RL, have read WAY too many unbelievable drunks and hookups … goony little fangirls need to look up some of that Quistis/Cid pr0n); Winter-Dragon (I find a lot of my stories deals with the way people deal with each other … I totally love interaction); Asphalt Angel (wow! Am I famous?); gauntlet challenge (I'm glad it's believable);  Karie (thanks, and stay tuned); Ripley (I'm glad to hear you think like I do; Quistis and I are really very much alike); Caroline (I so totally love feedback on "waves".  Thanks a ton!  There are some new pages up.  My art has evolved so much this summer alone … I promise, I'm not a horrible artist.  And I like the new page re-do as well … entirely HTML selftaught b/c I think it's cool)._

_Blah, I am so random.  Usually I don't do thank-yous, so if I forget you, it's only because I'm lazy.  I always check my reviews, and they're always meaningful – especially now, when people keep throwing those proverbial lemons at me.  Those fucks._

_Thanks again, and stay tuned as always._

_7th_

_"rumour has it that she was a former pro wrestler,  a stellar babe, and even that she was just totally _feline_ … well, whatever she was, like,  she wrote music that kicks rocks"_


	4. The Beginning of the End

_[mmm ... merci beaucoup to the cowboy bebop soundtrack for seeing me through this chapter [and a lot of the rest of my life, really]. Yoko Kanno, i would love to somehow have your children.]_

_[and by the way ... shameless plug ... this is where knowing "sincerity cowboy" might come in a bit handy. The middle part, at least. Go read it! Waiii!]_

  
  
  
  
  
  


Chapter Four

the beginning of the end

  
  
  
  


Sitting on the train, Quistis glanced up to briefly watch the play of sun on water flicking past the field of her vision. She was currently inside the SeeD car of the cross-oceanic line, on her way into Galbadia, the present details of her mission strewn across her lap and the remainder of the cushioned bench beside her. On the floor by her feet rested a classy briefcase containing all of Xu's "fun gadgets" - a brand new, Garden-issued laptop and a portable phone among them. She took a sip of the obligatory coffee and turned her eyes back to the papers.

The information package was set up in standard Garden report form: first, her abstract and objective, then the background information surrounding the mission. Quistis knew most of it, but dutifully scanned the document, not wanting to miss any details - and besides, it wasn't as if she had anything else to do.

Irvine Kinneas had been made a Special Instructor to train a program of SeeD for a specific mission; however, once the mission details were made known, they had rubbed the cowboy slightly backwards. Irvine had passed his misgivings on to Squall and Cid, who had investigated. Although the commission had been real - it was some sort of jump on illegal weapons-trading - at some point along the line it had been altered and edited. Someone along the Garden line of command had hacked in and tweaked the orders, changing the requested number of cadets and their objectives until the mission was doomed to failure. It had been tracked down to four SeeD cadets, who were currently under secret investigation by Agents Tilmitt and Kinneas. Another tweaked mission had been caught before assignment, as well, now that people were looking. Her job now was to find who was behind the rest of it, and why.

What worried Quistis was the subtlety of the thing.

Now, it was well known that not everyone liked Garden. Yes, the installations acted to uphold peace in the world - but they _were_ mercenaries who had to set prices on things like decency, dignity, and lives. Certain parts of the SeeD program were quite unpopular, really, and had caused a great deal of protest. Unsurprisingly. There were always people to protest everything in the world, and nothing - no one person, organization, or Garden - could please everyone, everywhere, all of the time.

But normally the protests against Garden and its way of life were large affairs - or at least obvious. This was shifty, and it worried Quistis. The orders had been changed in such a precise way - whoever was behind it knew exactly what they were doing. And, more importantly, how to do it with the smallest chance of getting caught.

That worried her even more, because it meant that it was an insider. Someone with SeeD experience. 

It incensed her. Quistis has always been SeeD through and through - one of the few 'lifers' (as they were called in the hallways). She'd loved the structure and functionality of the academy, and had been grateful to it for 'rescuing' her from the foster family she had tried so hard to love. It had her loyalty above all things - save her orphan family, now that she had remembered them. There had been a time that Garden had been first. It was still close.

The background promised full details of the Tilmitt-Kinneas mission as soon as they came through; Quistis had tried to get in touch with her friends the previous night, but they hadn't been around - in fact, they hadn't even logged in. Torn between worry and exasperation, Quistis had only left a brief message, nothing that would have given away their confidentials. She had wanted to get some first-hand detail from them, but it seemed that she'd have to wait until their paperwork came through.

From there the report moved into the more recent data - email files had been found, computer logs had been altered, and money has been exchanged. Apparently Galbadia had managed to trace a couple of the emails, and so Quistis had decided to head to Galbadia to start. Martine had promised her almost unlimited access to their information database, and Quistis figured it was as good a starting point as any.

Now that she had read the mission documents, she had to agree with Cid - there was something amiss. It was a puzzle: who would have this sort of access to the mission logs? And why change the missions?

Her mind quickly produced a detailed list of reasons, all of which were theories. Make Garden look bad. Waste valuable resources and SeeD cadets on failed missions. Destroy credibility. Create confusion. But - what? What was underneath it?

Quistis absently tapped the folder on her thigh as she narrowed her eyes in thought. Motivation. She'd need to find that out. She needed information, yes - lots of it. But in order to catch them, to stay one step ahead of them, she'd need to think like they do. Reasons and rules: Quistis Trepe's lifestyle.

She laughed at herself and began gathering the pages together. Her entire life followed the scientific method - but in this case she didn't even have enough data to make a hypothesis yet. She was still defining the problem.

And yet now that she had a defined problem, she realized, much of her sense of worry and doubt had vanished, replaced with a familiar calm confidence. Now that she had a defined job, a specific set of questions to answer and requirements to fulfill, she was much more relaxed about the whole thing. Now that there was a task to be done - one that she was particularly suited for - she could stand tall again. She had placed her confidence back into her height - she wouldn't be what she was without a reason, right?

Determined once again, Quistis packed up her things and spent the rest of the trip watching the scenery pass.

Getting into Galbadia now-a-days was not as easy as, say, getting into Balamb. Everything Galbadian was suspect after the Second Sorceress War; even the Galbadians suspected themselves sometimes. Their banking system was inherently on the verge of collapsing, their economy was dropping, and their borders were well-checked. Quistis had chosen to simply take the train and enter like a normal person (Zell had offered her a ride in the Ragnarok, but it had just been an excuse to fly the Ragnarok, and they both knew it). 

She arrived at Galbadia Garden soon after and was shown to one of the guest suites, where she had made arrangements to stay. Fixing up her small computer to the i-link portal, she logged on to the Balamb Garden network and checked through her mail. Notes from students, ads for porn and shampoo, and the notification that Selphie and Irvine had, finally logged back their mission conformation. Quistis sent them back a witty reply, grinning. She liked the laptop; Xu had certainly chosen well.

She created a new entry in her own personal log and sat for a second, idly tapping the screen with a fingertip.

_Have arrived at Galbadia Garden. Mission details have been thoroughly read and will be committed to memory. Main question: What provides motivation? Must find driving force behind actions to find culprit._

A pause, and then she continued, long fingers tapping. _What worries me is the insinuation that someone from within Garden is involved. Must determine extent of Garden involvement - don't want to make accusations. Does the real driving force come from within or without? _

She scanned it over, grinning when she realized she had used the word "culprit", and saved the file, pass-wording it for her own security. Slipping the laptop back into its case, she picked up her folders and headed up to Headmaster Martine's office to see what they had for her.

Martine was busy, but Era Maxus - the tall, light-haired, narrow-faced Commander of Galbadia Garden - offered to show her their results. Quistis had met Maxus once or twice, and although she had nothing against the man, she wasn't quite sure if she liked him, either. 

"When we heard you were coming, Martine had me set aside the information we've already obtained," he said as they walked down the hall. "It isn't much - we've had to deal with all these personal information protection laws and such. Plus, this mission technically isn't under our jurisdiction - it's yours." They turned a corner and headed down the administrative wing.

"Even a fully-certified Headmaster isn't allowed to access these files normally," Maxus continued, throwing Quistis a smile. "But under cases of extreme duress or threat to Garden, we can get some of the data. Martine and I tweaked and pleaded until they opened up the e-mail tracking logs for us." He held the door open, gesturing with another smile for her to enter.

Quistis smiled back politely, the now-familiar sense of being hit on registering in the back of her mind. Era Maxus was really being quite friendly - a little too friendly for her tastes, really. But she would permit it as long as it worked to her advantage. It sounded cold, she knew; but she also knew exactly what his interested politeness meant. It was something she had picked up from being one of few women in a field dominated by men, such as Garden's upper ranks. She had learned to ignore it - but politely.

"Oh, and here," he said, as they entered the room; a small plastic card was sitting on the single table. Papers were stacked over its surface; the walls were lined with filing cabinets. Quistis took the card in her hand; it was a temporary ID, her name on a small white label across its surface.

"That'll let you in here," Maxus said, "if we're not around. It's yours for up to a year; if your mission goes longer than that, we can renew it."

"Hyne forbid," Quistis said with a friendly laugh, tucking the card away in her slim wallet. "What do you have?"

Era Maxus scanned the table quickly, finally choosing one stack of papers. "These are the records of the two students from Galbadia who are under suspicion. Darik Halbred, graduate three months ago -"

"Wow," Quistis said with a sigh. "Three months and he's already suspect?"

"I know," Maxus said, smiling wryly. "What a way to tarnish a young career."

Quistis tapped her fingers on the papers gently. "Not tarnished yet. What did he do?"

"He's been marked absent or late to a lot of the administrative meetings we've been having - and nobody knows where he is. Plus, it was his login on one of the computers we tracked an email to."

Quistis shifted a chair slightly to allow herself to sit in it. "Tell me about these emails," she said. "You keep referencing them, but no one knows what's up."

"Ah." Maxus handed her the stack. "I keep forgetting this is your job - I'm just trying to be as helpful as possible," he said with an attempt at a winning smile. Quistis smiled briefly - _drat him_ - and turned her gaze to the folder in her hands.

"The four SeeDs under suspicion were caught by tracking email," Era Maxus continued, pulling up the chair across from her. Quistis tried to keep herself from wincing. "What happened was this: once the altered mission was found, we traced it - the actual act of alteration - back here. Embarrassing, I know, but we of course knew we hadn't done it. It was done through the computers - someone had obtained the access coding to the mission database."

Quistis hissed, a long breath drawn in through her teeth. "That's not good," she said. "How'd it happen?"

"Don't know." Maxus shrugged. "We're plugging the hole in the security as we speak. More correctly, it's been plugged, and is now being sealed, caulked, and barricaded."

Quistis smiled involuntarily. "Good to hear, Commander. What about the emails?"

He reached across for the folder, worn fingers briefly touching her long slender ones. "We noted the logon codes for all the other computers in Garden - all the other computers that were active on the Network. Then we waited for it to happen again, and mix-and-matched."

Her eyes narrowed in thought. "Explain further."

Maxus flipped through the folder and then pulled out a single piece of paper on which was a highly detailed schematic. "This is the layout of our computer network. This computer here - the _Plasma_, right - keeps track of all the missions. But the room is constantly under lockdown. And no one had swiped an entry key at any time even close to the time we traced the alteration to having occurred."

Quistis turned the schematic to give herself a better look at it, tracing the connecting lines with her fingertips, thinking rapidly. "So someone hacked it?"

"Our guess is that someone put up a remote connection to alter the file. So we tracked the computers that could have been connected. Eventually we eliminated everyone but a single logon code."

"And that led you to Darik?"

"Well, actually, it led us to a friend of his: Astra Baker. It was her computer. We're still not entirely sure how she's involved - or," he amended quickly, "if either is really involved."

Quistis took the proffered folder back absently, her eyes still roving the network layout. It was stupid, really - basically _anyone_ with the right information could have reached _Plasma_. Since most of the central records ran out of it, everyone had to connect to it eventually. It would have been a pretty good hack; but with access codes, it could have been done from _anywhere._

But she looked at Era Maxus with a little more admiration. He had certainly done his share of homework; homework and some bonus studying, more like. She couldn't imagine Squall doing this much work for someone else's mission...

Then he met her eyes for a brief second, and she saw a strange emotion flicker across his face: aspiration? Hope? She dropped her eyes, trying to hide the mute sense of disgust. Of course.

He didn't want to be a _friend_. He didn't want to be helpful for helpful's sake. He wanted a chance with the famous Quistis Trepe.

There was a sudden shrill ring, and Maxus' face fell in a bit of dismay and panic. Reaching into his pocket, he pulled out a small portable phone, glancing at the screen. His face twisted in mild disgust.

"I have to take this," he said. "You be okay?"

More than okay. Quistis nodded, turning back to the folder as he left, closing the door behind him.

She wasn't quite sure why it irked her so. For all of her career she had been the subject of praise and admiration - shit, just look at the Trepies! She'd never considered herself gorgeous - at times, she was humiliatingly plain - but she also knew that people found her attractive. She'd never considered herself a genius, but she knew she had some sort of gift that made her at least smarter than average. But the odd sort of hopeful worship - that she had never been able to get used to.

Xu had once told her that she could easily have any man fall in love with her within ten minutes. _Tall, blond, and gorgeous, and you've got the brains to match it, Quis,_ her friend had said. _Any one you want - choose one._ And Quistis had said: _you're wrong, Xu._

_Look at Squall._

Of course, that was back when she hadn't understood her Squall-dreams. But Xu's words lingered in her mind. She didn't want to assume anything. But.

It still irked her. And then she felt arrogant for assuming the world was in love with her. So she did what she did best: ignored it, turning her mind to other issues, like the one on the table before her. Dismissing Maxus from her mind, she sat down to examine the schematic once again. Era Maxus would resolve himself. The mission wouldn't.

Keeping the schematic in one hand, she paged through the folder with the other. There was a massive collection of computer codes - apparently the tracking procedure they had used - which she skipped. The final page in the folder contained a listing of the emails actually sent with the forged access code. Quistis set the schematic down and picked this up, her eyes narrowing in thought. 

They had all been sent to the same email address, she saw. It was a general address, from one of the many sites that allowed free email registration - and as such would be nearly impossible to trace. The name was simply a random collection of numbers and letters: 78ELS; the hosting company was gilbert.com, which Quistis knew as a public free-email bonanza. There was absolutely no way to track it.

But they had all been sent to the same address.

She'd have to get her hands on the actual emails. Someone was connecting with Garden students through this email address. 

Wait - was it a two-way connection?

She nabbed her folder and the slim plastic card, her eyes still narrowed determinedly. No one would think _anything_ odd about a student receiving emails from a gilbert.com account - she was sure thousands of them passed through the server daily.

She found Era Maxus back in his office. He looked up at her, suspicion in his eyes for a second. "What's wrong?"

"Can you get me Darik and Astra's email logs?"

Maxus blinked. "What?" He gestured to the folder. "We found the emails they sent. They're from gilbert.com, they'll never give out any information; and besides, all you need to give Gilbert is a name. Any name. I have an account myself," he said sheepishly.

"Dazzling," Quistis said, almost shortly. "What I want to see is their _incoming_ logs."

Maxus blinked. "Can we do that?"

She bit her tongue in annoyance - he's been Commander for less time than Squall, remember that, he doesn't know everything - and said: "Technically, yes. It's not Garden's policy to police incoming mail. But a record of all mail received should stay on the server for up to two weeks. It's a safety net - that way students can't use the excuse 'I never got the mail' to their instructors. The Instructors can request permission to check all received mail."

"And if they got any mail from this account..." Maxus stood up, grinning nervously. "I'll give you a card for the _Plasma._ Your access will last for an hour; that's the longest we have."

Quistis hurried down the hall, biting her lip a little nervously. Her computer skills, though good, were nothing spectacular like Selphie's; she herself had a habit of demanding too much at once and making the computer crap out in a fantastic display of technical incompetence. She didn't want to crash the Galbadian server. Swiping the card, she let herself in and settled down.

Luckily, it was a fairly moron-proof interface. She found the email logs without a problem and began by entering Darik Hablred's student ID.

Email headings scrolled across the screen: incoming, outgoing, notes from friends and teachers, advertisements. Quistis watched idly as the system loaded his last two weeks of mail. Eventually the internal grinding died down; Quistis delicately loaded the search command for 78ELS.

Nothing popped up. Swearing lightly and wishing for coffee, Quistis cleared the search and entered Astra Baker's ID. The account loaded, though not as many mails as Darik's. She entered the term again.

Bang. One email.

Quistis opened it, eyes narrowing again. It was quite short:

_Objectives proceed as follows. Previously attached document should be enough directive. Action will be taken by Elsevier if you cannot meet objectives._

It was simply signed _Gray._

Quistis let out a sharp sigh of triumph. Two things to work with: Elsevier, Gray. Whether they were people, things, groups, weapons - who knew. But it was a start. 

Apparently Astra _was_ guilty - or Darik; or both. Quistis had a sudden pang of worry for Selphie and Irvine; at least one of their suspected would be defending themselves at all costs. Then she shook her head, laughing. Worried about Selphie and Irvine? Bah. The sharpshooter and the ball of energy. Nothing to worry about.

Quistis printed out a copy of the mail and tucked it in the back of the folder, then logged out of _Plasma_ and locked the room down. She met Era Maxus on her way back and handed him the ID card that had allowed her to access the room. 

"Find anything?" he asked eagerly, and Quistis was a little surprised and worried at the glint in his eyes. He wanted to be her conspirator, it seemed, her partner. She understood the excitement of a mission like this, but - he really had no part to play.

"No," she said, the lie slipping easily off her lips before she really knew what she was saying. "Nothing left for either of them. I'm going to check the same thing up at Trabia; see if their servers are still up."

Maxus sighed and shrugged. "Ah well," he said. "Glad we could help, anyway."

"I'll stick around for a little while," Quistis said, "and see if I can turn anything else up."

She returned to her room, exultant in her little bit of success. Opening her log, she quickly added:

_Astra Baker received email from account: 78ELS. Email traced. Outside source almost certainly involved; not logical for a source inside Garden to communicate through email. There are better, less obvious ways to reach people. Gilbert.com isn't one of them._

_Look for any information regarding [Elsevier] and [Gray], hopefully together. Search for 'Gray' on internet won't be helpful. Elsevier may lead to something, though._

She paused, and then laughing at herself - why not make it a journal too? _Era Maxus very interested in project. Hopefully Quistis Trepe doesn't become _his_ project. Can't stand people breathing over my shoulder in the hopes of catching the next wonder._

_Plan of action: do similar email check at Trabia Garden for two Trabian suspects. If similar email history, then move forward. Obtain information about Elsevier. Check public records and such._

She closed the top of her laptop with a delicate click. Looked as if this new job would involve a lot of traveling.

  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  


*************************

_Oy._

_Don't have time for the individual thanks, so let me just say: thank you, darlings, for your reviews. Please keep them coming, I love reading them. We'll talk more next time I update, since hopefully it will not be this late at night. Not that it's late; but it is when you work like 50/week and you totally need your sleep._

_Keep rocking._

_seventhe_

  
  
  
  
  
  



	5. The Shadows of a Science

_sorry. forgot italics the first time; this chap is a repost._

  
  
  
  


A Shine Like Gold

Chapter 5: The Shadows of a Science

  
  
  
  


Thick rain poured from a dark sky, hammering against the windows, beating with the wild rhythm only storms could produce. Quistis had awoken to the storm. She lay in bed on her back, staring at the ceiling, something between a smile and a frown teasing her lips.

She was on the train again. After leaving Galbadia she had hopped an express and spent the night in Crux, a little border town in western Trabia with fantastic seafood. She'd spent the morning in Crux, enjoying herself at a little café (fantastic espresso, though the coffee cake left something to be desired) and poring over her notes (all one page of them). The overnight train had left briefly after lunch and would set her in front of Trabia Garden early the next morning. She had never minded sleeping on the train - she'd done it enough on mission, Hyne knew - but she still found herself thinking of distances in Ragnarok-time. Much different than normal-human-train-time.

She rolled over in the train bunk. She'd had the compartment to herself, for which she was mildly grateful. It was nearing sunrise, she noted, and her stop was shortly after. She stood and stretched, arching her back with a grateful sigh. It felt like every bone in her body was cracking. She stretched as she changed from her military sweats back into her SeeD uniform. Poor muscles needed a little activity, she noted, and wondered idly whether Trabia's Training Center was still in one piece.

Poor Trabia. Quistis had only seen it the once - that one visit still overshadowed by memories of memories, gifts from the faeries - and had felt for it with all her heart. For Quistis, it had been especially tragic: in her mind, it had been Balamb's own spirals and gleam lying in pieces on the ground. That vision alone had made her heart hurt. It had given her the first and sweetest pang of sympathy she could remember in quite a long time; and yet Selphie, undeniable Selphie, hadn't needed it. Quistis's admiration for the spunky and unstoppable little girl had increased tenfold.

In the back of her head, she wondered if she would have dealt so well with Balamb's destruction.

But Quistis knew that Selphie had enjoyed her foster life; she had spoken a couple times of her 'parents' in Trabia and her life with them. Garden had been a school to young Selphie. It had never been a refuge, a home, a place of safety out of mere necessity. Selphie had known she had another place with another family if she needed it.

Quistis had never had that safety net. Garden had been house and home and family and refuge all in one. She'd never had another option; if she'd lost Balamb, she would have lost her life.

She had never considered her own foster family an option.

Younger Quistis had once angrily told Younger Xu that she'd run away first, become a vagabond in Esthar, before she went back to _that place_. Xu had laughed, her mind full of proper little Quistis Trepe wandering in rags and a mask and doing a jig for luck under the full moon. Younger Xu had said that Quistis would be more likely to scold the other bandits for not dancing properly and had gone off on an amazingly accurate imitation of Quisty, informing those wayward vagabonds just how the lucky dance steps were performed. Younger Quistis had taken a pillow to Younger Xu's head.

Later, Younger Xu had asked what had been so wrong with Quistis's original family. Younger Quistis had made a horribly nasty face and replied simply: "They wanted me to be a _girl._"

Older Quistis's eyes refocused on the rain. Girl. Her sex had defined her life: ever since the day she had walked away from the orphanage forever. Her foster parents had been determined to make her the perfect little girl. She had disappointed, to put it simply. And then, at Garden, she had become one of few top females in an almost purely-male environment. It had been -

The phone rang, a shrill cry interrupting her thoughts. She reached down to her bag instinctively and pulled out that tiny communicator she had received with the laptop. The screen read Balamb Garden's identification number, so she flipped the _on_ switch. "Trepe," she said.

"Morning," replied Xu's familiar voice; it was so fresh in Quistis's mind that she had to think twice to confirm that it really was her friend. "Where are you?"

"En route to Trabia," Quistis replied. Her scalp itched lightly and she had a brief fantasy of a hot shower and a large cup of coffee. "I thought I'd reported that."

"Damn." There was a faint crackle, either static or Xu's papers shuffling. "You're still on the damn train?"

"Yes ma'am," Quistis said, a note of amusement in her voice. "What's so urgent?"

Xu sighed. "Tilmitt-Kinneas mission's up," she said, definitely not laughing. 

Quistis froze. "Finished early?"

"Gig's up," Xu replied shortly. "Cover blown, confrontation, the entire works. Just finished interrogation, first level."

"Confrontation?" Quistis asked sharply. "Details. What level?"

"Code seven," Xu replied. "They're okay, Quis. Our Deling City apartment's been blown to shreds, though."

Quistis let out a relieved bark of laughter. "Source?"

"Tilmitt's GF over-reacted, from what their report read," Xu said, amusement now coloring her normally direct voice.

"Damn Selphie and her explosion fetish." Quistis knew that Selphie's compatibility with Quezacotl had peaked, and she expected her friend's overzealous urges had become a part of the thunder bird's nature. "Long as they're alright. Mission results?"

A tapping traveled over the line, Xu's perfectly sharpened pencil echoing off the desk Quistis was picturing her at. "Two confirmed. One cleared. One in suspect. Interrogation completed." She paused. "Directive is to get you these mission details, Quis - ASAP."

Quistis narrowed her eyes in thought. "Forward them to Trabia," she said finally. "Headmaster's link there should be secure, right?"

"Right, can do," Xu replied. "Pick them up when you get there."

"Anything important?"

There was a longish pause. "It's an outside deal," she said finally. "Don't want to get into too much detail." Another pause. "Definitely tracked outside Garden, though."

Quistis debated asking her friend about her two hints -_ever heard of "Elsevier"?_ - but decided to wait for the mission report. "Thought as much," she replied. "Nothing urgent?"

"It'll wait for you in Trabia," replied the smart voice on the other end. "Luck, Trepe. Out."

"Trepe out," she replied, as the whistle for the Trabia Garden stop blew.

Quistis gathered her things and stepped off the train. The storm had turned as the sun rose; it was now the light, chilling, prickly rain she knew would eventually turn to snow, paired with the kind of wind that skipped right through clothes and flesh and settled directly in your bones. Hugging her SeeD uniform jacket around her, she walked briskly to pick up her rental car. Throwing her suitcase in the back (and setting the case with her expensive toys gently in the seat), she adjusted the seat and took off for Trabia Garden. The dream of the shower manifested itself again, driven by the chilling frost in the tips of her fingers. Quistis added another cup of coffee and some scented bath gel.

It was both heartbreaking and heartwarming when she came over the final hill of the road. Trabia had certainly improved since the last time she had been there - the crumbling stones were now spotted with temporary caravans and office trailers, makeshift dormitories and a cafeteria on wheels. But its tragic grandeur remained: the Garden was no more. Shining, ethereal, castle-like Trabia with its two spiraling towers now lay in cracked pieces on the snow.

Quistis parked the rental, giving the return slip to the worker, and adjusted the collar of her coat in a lame attempt to combat that Hyne-awful wind. Gathering her things, she trudged through the slush of the parking lot (a space of lawn had been cleared for the purpose) and up into the nearest and largest building, hoping to Bahamut that it held someone who could direct her to a shower. Not only was she uncomfortable, the kind of discomfort that only spending a night on a train could produce; but she was freezing. At this point the fantasy was teasing the hell out of her. She considered adding a naked man or two - at least that would send it back to the realm of the unbelievable.

She opened the door and almost leapt in; the air was packed with freezing microscopic droplets of rain that gathered at her nose and ears like packs of Blizzaga-suffering mosquitos, and the daggers of the wind had sliced through her long legs. The door slammed behind her and she almost _panted_ in the sudden heat wave, her glasses fogging immediately.

There was a light chuckle, and a woman's voice said, "I take it the storm's here."

"I don't know if you'd call it a storm," Quistis gasped, the warm air flooding her lungs, "but those of us from Balamb sure do." She removed her glasses, meaning to wipe them on her jacket; the jacket, however, was covered with a thin layer of water droplets. She gamely tucked them in her breast pocket and turned to meet her companion.

A friendly woman smiled at her from behind a desk. She was pale-skinned, with a pointed face and sharp blue eyes framed by black hair. Quistis warmed to her immediately; there was a playful flavor to her smile which was intriguing. Something about her bearing was a little off, however; something Quistis figured out as the girl emerged from behind the desk in a state-of-the-art wheelchair.

"Balamb?" she asked. "You'd be Quistis Trepe."

Quistis nodded with a smile. "Yes. I hope I'm not an inconvenience to anyone."

"Beh," the girl said, awkwardly wheeling herself back behind her desk. "This storm is more of an inconvenience. We've got plenty of rooms - t'ain't many people left here. I assume you saw them on your way in?"

"The trailers?" Quistis asked.

"Sure thing. Not pretty, but they're nicer inside than you'd expect for a dorm on wheels." The girl flashed her a grin. "You won't be able to tell once you're inside."

"Fantastic," Quistis said. "You wouldn't happen to have - networking in the dorms, would you?"

The girl made a face. "Yeah, right. Library was apparently at the bottom of the heap. All of Trabia is running off wireless from this office - trailer - actually. You could connect here or in one of our administrative wings."

Quistis, catching the girl's grin, asked: "Wings?"

"Companion trailers," she said with a snort. "Whatever. We like to pretend that we're a fully functional administration." Her eyebrows lifted in remembrance. "Oh, bloody Ifrit. Sh- Headmaster Shain is in meetings all morning. He won't be able to see you until later, after lunch."

Quistis allowed a smile to cross her face. "Fantastic," she repeated. "I think I'd have someone's child for a shower and a cup of coffee."

"An interesting offer," the girl said with an amused grin, "but I can understand. Our storms have been known to do worse." She turned to a computer, tapping away quickly. "I feel like a hotel clerk checking reservations, but - we _do_ have a room reserved for you, C-wing, C-37 to be exact. There's a shower in there, cafeteria's attached, and whatever you want to do about that child thing is your own business."

"Thank you so much," Quistis replied, every bone in her body aching for the hot water. "I really appreciate it."

"No worries," the girl said cheerfully, wheeling herself a little closer to hand Quistis a plastic ID card much like the one she had received in Galbadia. "You'll have to go back outside, but only for a bit - down to your left, it's the trailer with the big 'C'. Should I make you an appointment with the Headmaster?"

"That'd be great," Quistis said.

The girl studied the scheduling book and then nabbed a pencil. "I've filled his afternoon for you," she said with a grin. "He has filing to do anyways - show up whenever you want." She gestured at a closed door behind her, decorated by a thin golden plaque.

A little shocked at her audacity, Quistis paused. "All afternoon?"

"How else am I going to get him to do his work?" the girl asked with a cheerful grin. "I may be the secretary, but he can't just throw a mess at me and expect me to know everything. Especially with things marked 'Top Secret'. Don't worry, I do it all the time."

"Have you worked for him long?" Quistis asked, amused.

The girl smiled wanly. "Since the bombing. This" - a grimace and gesture at the wheelchair - "keeps me from doing anything else. They stuck all the cripples at desk jobs."

Quistis winced, hardly knowing what to say. "I'm so sorry for your loss," she said.

But the perky girl smiled at her, a spunky spirit which suddenly reminded her of Selphie. "No worries," she said. "So many people were hurt much worse, or died, or lost someone they loved. I was _lucky_. And I'm gonna keep thinking about it like that."

"Good for you," Quistis said, a real smile spreading across her face. What a friendly personality. She liked the girl already. If only all the Gardens had spirit like this.

"You'd better go take that shower," the girl said, waving at the door. "You look prime to fall over, Miss Trepe."

"Thank you so much," Quistis said, picking up her bag and bracing herself for the bone-chilling wind. "I'll be back after lunch, then. And many cups of coffee."

"Shain has his own coffee-pot, don't worry," the girl called at her back.

The promise of hot water drew her through the wind; she quickly spotted the trailer marked with a "C" seemingly constructed from electrical tape. She let the door scan her card; the light flashed from red to green, and Quistis moved faster than she thought she had ever moved in her life. She was vaguely sure that Ultimecia had been worse than the cold - but only barely. Edea's own Ice Strike could learn a thing or two from the Trabian wind.

As her frozen limbs came back to life, she headed down the hall, scanning left and right until her quick eyes found room 37. The door scanned her card, approving her with a chirp, and finally Quistis was inside. Nothing stood between her and her warm shower.

She peeled the soaking wet SeeD uniform off piece by piece until she stood, shivering and slightly damp in only her bra and panties. For a fraction of a second she looked guiltily at the symbolically discarded pieces of the uniform she wore every day, which were now giving her a mocking yet slightly damp glare from where they lay, strewn across the bed. She'd have to wash them later - she wanted warmth, and she wanted it _now._

The hot water beat into her skin with gentle force, a storm Quistis welcomed gladly for a change. She remained motionless, the heat seeping through her skin. She could feel it diffusing into her bones. Not for the first time, she thanked the laws of thermodynamics.

After thoroughly thawed, she concentrated on washing the train-born stiffness from her muscles. For a few brief minutes Quistis vaguely teased the notion of spending the rest of the day in the hot shower, letting everything related to Garden and treason and subterfuge slip past her like the streams of water over her skin. The thought of crumbled Trabia brought her back to her senses: not only did her sense of loyalty realize Trabia needed assistance, but her sense of practicality admitted that Trabia might soon run out of hot water.

She wrapped one thick towel around her dripping hair and, quickly patting her limbs dry, wrapped a second around her slim waist and slipped out of the steamy bathroom. Her damp, chilled, and slightly insulted SeeD uniform was waiting for her, still in its crumpled pile on her bed. She glared at it as she threw her suitcase open, pulling out fresh undergarments. Dry clothes caught her eye.

Quistis dug through them, cursing loudly. Somewhere in here were her Garden-issue slacks; the women received a feminine version of the male trousers, though they were less popular. Her own pair would be wrinkled to Hyne's Green Heaven and back, but they would do - much more nicely than the storm-dampened skirt. Headmaster Shain - whoever he was - would have to deal with wrinkled slacks.

She finally found them, paired with her second uniform blouse. The jacket was hopeless - no one received two jackets - but hopefully the blouse would fend off the dampness. Finally beginning to pick up a chill, she threw on the dry clothes, reveling in their warmth. Dry socks followed. Quistis only glanced at her sopping-wet uniform flats; her battle-boots emerged from beneath her suede leather fighting outfit. 

She looked longingly at the battle-gear: leather of some northern dragon, worn soft and smooth by time and usage. It was a warm, neutral shade: a combination of rose, peach, and coffee, with darker mocha gloves and boots. Quistis loved it. But it wouldn't do to meet a headmaster in one's battle-gear. Uniform was required by protocol.

Deftly she pinned her hair to the top of her head, then tossed the wet jacket over her shoulder and went off in search of a path to the cafeteria.

It was easy to find; bold signs at the ends of each hall directed the wayward around Trabia's remains. Quistis was content to pick up a large cappuccino and a bagel, resting in the little café-trailer attached on the end of trailer C and reveling in warmth and dryness.

Finally the relaxation got the better of her; her mind, unused to breaks, was ready to apply itself back to her mission. She stopped in the room to pick up her briefcase and then (cursing under her breath as she struggled into the clammy jacket) headed back to the Headmaster's trailer.

The young girl behind the front desk was gone; still out on lunch, Quistis supposed. But the Headmaster's door was open, and she heard tell-tale signs of motion. She _did_ have an appointment; and besides, she had to pick up the mission report Xu had sent through for her. Taking a couple quiet steps past the desks, she positioned herself in front of the door with a polite knock.

The man inside had been sorting through an overstuffed bookshelf; he looked up at the knock, and Quistis found herself momentarily frozen in shock. Bright green eyes met hers boldly and inquisitively. It took her a few seconds to realize that this dark-haired student was quite high on the list of _most attractive people ever._ That realization alone made her blink.

But for being a student, he seemed rather old. Maybe he was a fellow Instructor; he was perhaps a few years older than she. His eyebrows deepened into a frown, and a soft black curl fell into his face. Quistis noted briefly that he was wearing a soft gray sweater and khakis - not the Headmaster, then; much too young. An Instructor, or administrator of some sort, on a day off.

She realized that he was staring at her intrusion. "Can I help you?" he asked, rather bluntly.

"I'm sorry," she said, absently smoothing her slacks. "I'm looking for Headmaster Shain."

An eyebrow rose, elegantly. "I'm sorry, but I have appointments all afternoon," he said. "You can make an appointment with Cassie for tomorrow, maybe - isn't she at the desk?"

At the desk? "I spoke with her this morning - she said I had an appointment this afternoon." She paused, the pieces suddenly coming together. Her mind produced two coherent thoughts: _he thinks I'm a student_ collided with _this is the Headmaster!_ and left her brain momentarily stunned.

His eyes lit up with surprise as he, too, figured out the situation; he stood and ran a hand through his dark hair, grinning. "You're Trepe, then. Instructor Quistis Trepe, from Balamb? I'm sorry, I recognize you now. Those pictures didn't do you justice. It's a pleasure to meet you."

Bemused, Quistis shook his hand. In the back of her mind she had been imagining Headmaster Shain Sheridan as, well, a typical headmaster: Era Maxus, perhaps, wearing Cid's sweater-vest and telling Martine's stories. This gorgeous kid belonged in SeeD ranks, not in the office. He was - well, a kid. Casual through and through. _He's wearing a sweater and khakis!_

"I'm so sorry," Headmaster Shain was saying. "Cassie had mentioned that you came in frozen over and ran off to thaw first. I expected you to show up wearing sweats and sweaters, honestly."

Quistis managed to smile and be insulted at the same time. It would've been a great breach of Garden protocol to introduce one's self to a Headmaster - or any ranking officer - in anything less than uniform. She was close to embarrassed to have her own uniform wrinkled. But she made a quick mental note: Shain doesn't seem to subscribe to propriety. Perhaps next time she got soaked in the wind she could get away with her battle-gear.

She noticed Shain looking at her face oddly, and realized that she had not yet spoken - or released his hand. "It's nice to meet you," she said, giving him a polite smile in return. "I believe you also received a transcript for me this morning?"

Headmaster Shain blinked, retrieving his hand to run it again through his hair. "Did I?"

She remembered he had been in meetings all morning. "The results of the Tilmitt-Kinneas mission, sir."

"Tilmitt-Kinneas mission," Shain mused. "Yes - the one that started it all, right? Your own mission was formulated from what we predicted out of this one." He headed over to the fax machine, and Quistis noticed with distaste the relatively large stack of papers. "Let's see what we've got." He paged through the pile, pulling out two packets and setting them on a cluttered desk. "Neatly stapled, too - Hyne, that machine is the best. Here you are, Instructor Trepe."

Quistis reached out to receive her copy. "I've been in meetings all morning," Headmaster Shain said as he sat behind his desk, "so I haven't had a chance to peruse it either. Pull up a chair, Instructor. Would you care for a cup of coffee?"

Quistis noticed as she sat that the only remotely clean area of the office was a shrine to the Headmaster's coffee-maker; her mouth tweaked in a smile. "Yes, sir," she replied as she sat. "Thank you."

She began to skim the document as Shain got to work with the coffee. Her eyes devoured the cover page urgently, looking for detail. _SeeD cadets Vanesa Adair, Trabia and Darik Halbred, Galbadia, caught guilty in acts of subterfuge against Garden and against fellow SeeD. Dall McCloud, Trabia, cleared of charges. Astra Baker, Galbadia, found associate of the guilty party._

The following section contained the summary from active SeeDs Tilmitt and Kinneas. Quistis scanned the statements from Selphie and Irvine describing the relative incompetence and rivalry of the SeeD cadets in question and the confrontation that ensued. The next page contained Xu's more thorough examination of the cadets. Quistis skipped to the conclusion page; she knew how Xu worked. The conclusions could be concise and direct, and she could read the details later, when she had more time.

_SeeDs Adair and Halbred were contacted by an outside organization asking intimate questions about garden protocol. Subjects responded and email communications began. Organization never personally contacted students and never used the same email address twice. Adair and Halbred give organization name as Elsevier, but gave no further information, citing lack of information themselves._

Quistis sighed in triumph. "Two sources," she said, stabbing the paper with a finger.

"Eh?" She had forgotten about the Headmaster, who was reading over her shoulder, holding two steaming cups of coffee. He offered one to her, which she took gracefully, sipping carefully; it was rich and delicious. "Two sources of what?"

"Confirmation," Quistis said. "You know the rules: mentioned once, rumour. Mentioned twice, fact. Mentioned three times, confirmation."

"What are they mentioning?" Shain asked, taking his seat.

Quistis momentarily narrowed her eyes in thought. Shain's face held none of Era Maxus's quirky interest; he seemed more determined, focused on the facts. Besides - Cid had told her to trust the Headmasters.

"Ever heard of an organization by the name of Elsevier?" she asked him.

His eyes narrowed similarly. "Yes. Why?"

"Well, I haven't. But they're apparently the ones behind this. Two sources: once in this report, confirmed, and once in an email I tracked back at Galbadia."

"Aren't those the same source?" Shain sipped his coffee. "The email was to one of these students, I assume."

"Yes," she replied, "but no. This report is one source: vocal confirmation to Investigator Xu under interrogation. Second source is the tracked email. One could be forged or a lie - but we use the evidence to support the confession."

"The force of reason," Shain mused, stirring the cup in front of him.

"Exactly," Quistis said. Her sharp mind then presented her with a fact that had slipped her attention: "You've heard of Elsevier before?"

"Yes ma'am," Shain replied. "We've had trouble with them in the past - well, one branch - it was way before my time but ...hey, Cass!" The last was yelled towards the door.

Quistis saw the friendly young woman in the wheelchair slowly maneuver herself through the door. "Yes, sir?"

Shain gave her a smile. "You remember what happened to that Elsevier report?"

The girl cocked her head. "Which, sir?"

Shain stood up and headed to one of many filing cabinets along the walls. "It got pulled out of the archives after the bombing, remember? Then, when we cleared everything up about the source, they just vanished."

"Well, I put them away, sir," Cassie replied smartly; "you hadn't so much as touched them in weeks."

Quistis watched Shain and Cassie bicker, intrigued and amused. The direct, pointed segment of her mind wanted the data; if Elsevier had caused trouble before, why weren't they on the list of Garden Suspect? The other part of her mind watched the relationship between the Headmaster and his secretary. Headmaster Shain was much more casual and easy-going than any other Headmaster she'd ever met. Plus, it was obvious that the young girl was partially in love with him.

Finally the pair pinpointed the location of the files in question; Cassie went to retrieve them, and Shain returned to his desk, smiling. "I don't always send the cripple to do my work," he said with apology, "but if I try to protest, she gets angry."

"I heard that!" A voice sounded from the hallway, half amused and half insulted. "Do you want these files or not?"

"What would I do without you?"

She reappeared in the doorway, a pile of manila folders balanced carefully on her lap as she guided the wheelchair in. "Much better," she said with a winning smile for Quistis. "Your files, sir."

Shain paged through them as Quistis watched. "After the bombing," he explained, his eyes on the pages within, "we pulled out what we considered every possible suspect. Before we knew - who was actually behind it. I remember that Elsevier's file got pulled; rather close to the top, too."

"They were suspect?" Quistis asked sharply. "How so?"

"Well," Shain continued, his voice light, "this was before my time here, of course. Do you know anything about them?" She shook her head softly. "Ah, well that makes sense."

His fingers paused on the folders. "Elsevier began as a scientific research community: an organization dedicated to explaining the gifts of neomagic and sorcery. Back in their heyday they were more well-known than O-Lab; actually, Odine worked with _them_ for a while, before he split."

"Research?" Quistis mused, eyes narrowing again. "How so?"

Shain glanced at her and then back at the folders. "You know - experimentation, publication, like any other science. The problem with Elsevier - apparently - was that very often their scientists mixed philosophy and science together. Ideals and facts don't always mix well. People began to argue about beliefs, and the organization began wasting its funding - and losing money."

"But what exactly did they research?"

Shain's small smile held no real joy. "They began in neomagic development, soon after the Draw technique became wildly popular. But from there they turned to actual sorcery - real, blood-based magic. Sorceresses."

"Oh." Her voice was flat.

"What happened was that Elsevier - the entire organization - was bought out. The man who bought them out was, again, more focused in ideology than scientific practice. He began a series of experiments that frayed the company to the point of destruction."

"What sort of ideology?"

Shain idly flipped through a folder. "They were the first Pro-Sorceress faction, Quistis. Their new President-"

"Pro-Sorceress?" Quistis sat up in her seat. "You're kidding, right? Everybody around is Anti-Sorceress - you know, they're dangerous, powerful, uncontrollable. _Nobody_ would dare be Pro-Sorceress, sir - not now."

Shain nodded in agreement. "It started out as a good idea, in theory. They wanted to help Sorceresses develop their powers for the good of the world. You know," he said, smiling a little, "those with gifts like your friend Ellone could help people travel to the past and take care of their own demons. And a well-trained Dark Sorceress - your Rinoa Heartilly - could do plenty. A Sorceress with enough control could eliminate drought and famine, cure plague. That's the kind of thing they wanted - in theory."

"But theory-land and real-life don't always mix," Quistis said quickly, and Headmaster Shain nodded. "So this pro-Sorceress science went where?"

"Well, instead of helping Sorceresses develop, Elsevier decided they could develop the Sorcery powers themselves. So they began hunting Sorceresses."

Quistis's eyes narrowed. "Hunting."

"And that's where they came to us," Shain said, long fingers selecting one folder from the bunch and placing it on the table between them. "Someone at some point leaked that the point of Garden was to defeat the Sorceresses."

She took a second to put the pieces together. "So they labeled _Garden_ as Anti-Sorceress - figured we were a threat to their goals. If we eliminated the Sorceresses..."

"They'd never get to their powers, yes." Shain stared down at the folder, his voice suddenly low. "A couple years back - when Abrya was still Headmaster - they were sending threats against Trabia. Wanted us to discontinue SeeD so that they could capture the Sorceresses and do things with their magic. Nothing came of it; they're much too dissociated now to cause any real damage. But their file was pulled when we got bombed; for a while, we thought it might have been them."

Quistis reached out, her long fingers resting atop the manila folder between them. "Am I allowed to take this?" she asked carefully.

Headmaster Shain looked up at her and gave her a handsome grin, his dark mood dissipating as quickly as it had appeared. "Of course."

She ignored the grin. "I mean - is it confidential?"

"Of course it is," he replied. "But I can release it at my discretion, and I think this is a situation where the information will be useful. Take that and do only good with it."

"I'll try not to hit anyone with it," Quistis said sarcastically as she tucked it into her briefcase along with the report from Xu.

"Just make sure it's the right person," Shain said, grinning at her again.

"Do you have someone in mind?" she shot back, reaching for her coffee.

Shain laughed out loud, a deep and friendly chuckle. "I can think of plenty of people who could use a good swatting," he said with a playful smirk, and then added: "but I'm sure you can as well."

"I know a few," she said, answering his smirk as she lifted the cup to her lips.

"Only a few?" Shain reached for his own cup. "I'm disappointed in you, Instructor Trepe."

"You be careful," she said with a slow smile, "or I'll add you to the list."

Shain chuckled again. "I had assumed I was already there."

Quistis burst out with a quick laugh. "In that case," she said, reaching for the file again, "just stay still for a second-"

"A good move, Miss Trepe," Cassie called from the door, interrupting the reverie. "All the pretty girls say that. Sir, there's a call for you on line two from Deling City. I think it's financing. Shall I take a message, or are you available?"

"Well, you could tell them I was busy being swatted," Shain began, but Quistis stood.

"No worries, sir. I have enough work to do as it is."

His eyes met hers, a playful gleam still present, and Quistis couldn't help but smile. At the same time, she felt an odd pang of worry. Headmaster Shain was so - different. How had this fun-loving, casual, drop-dead-gorgeous jokester become the Headmaster of Trabia Garden? Who had put him in charge? And was the personality genuine, or a front?

"Alright, Cass," Shain said with a resigned sigh. "I'll take the call. Instructor, I'll talk to you later, I assume."

"I appreciate your help," she replied with a smart salute, and left the office.

Back in her own room (accompanied with a fresh coffee from the caf) she spread the papers out on the bed. She had immediately changed into her fleece pants and a soft long-sleeved t-shirt. Curled up with her mission report, the details of Elsevier's past spread around her, she got to work. 

Somewhere in the stack of papers in front of her was the answer. Something would connect and give her a direction. It was up to her to put the pieces together.

Quistis Trepe loved a good puzzle.

  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  


_Beh. This chapter was pretty long. Then again, I owed you all a large portion of story._

  
  


_I do have an announcement to make, explaining why my usually frantic story-writing has been less than frantic recently. In two weeks, I'll be moving to Delaware. I've accepted a great offer for a co-op job with DuPont (basically, I take a year off of school, earn money and get loads of experience, then go back and finish my degree), and my summer has been pretty hectic putting things together. The next two weeks or so promise to be even more hectic: not only do I have to continue to work my 40/week and finish up two simultaneous projects at work, but I have to get everything together to move my life down to Delaware and start the new job. I love you and I love Quistis, but the chances of me settling down in front of my computer to write are slim. I have a paper to finish on hemoglobin, and although that's a lot more boring than this, it's also paying me. You probably won't hear from me for another two weeks while I get my life in gear (hence I wrote a bunch for this chapter)._

_Feel free to wish me luck, I certainly need it ^^. If anyone knows super sweet things to do in the northern-Delaware area (I'll be in Wilmington), please send them my way._

_I'd like to thank everyone individually, but I'm writing this in Delaware right now (came down to look for a place to live, figure that's kind of important, plus the sitting-in-the-hotel thing gave me lots of writing time) and so I can't get on the Internet. I appreciate all the wonderful comments, though; I hope you'll all hang around and wait for me to continue. _

  
  


_Sneak Preview!! Totally awesome and stuff!!_

_In the next chapter, Quistis actually does something nice for Rinoa and discovers the identity of the mysterious man called "Gray". And then she drinks some coffee. Who would have guessed?_

  
  


_Alright, stay cool. Email me with anything fun._

_Seventhe_

  
  
  
  
  
  



	6. The Whisper of an Answer

  
  


A Shine Like Gold

Chapter Six: The Whisper of an Answer

  
  
  
  
  
  


_Stupid Hyne-damn ass-monkey mother-fucking son of a hooker -_

Snap! The T-Rexaur's paralysis wore off and Quistis leapt back quickly, narrowly avoiding the wild lash of its tail. Just her luck: she'd been calmly (well, relatively) perusing (swearing at) her neatly organized report (now strewn across the floor) when a wild Rex had squashed most of Trailer C. Fuck. Her instincts had thrown her into the battle without so much as a thought - and that thought would have been appreciated, since she was now wearing fleece pants and slippers in the Trabian tundra. Grasping her whip. And swearing up her own Trabian storm. Luckily, that first instinct had included a Stop spell, which had given her enough time to gather her wits (well, relatively) and order everyone else away from Trailer C with a loud yell to the general Trabian public.

She wasn't worried - Rexaurs were hard, but she knew how to deal with them; and she was more than a match for one once her adrenaline began to rise - she was more _pissed._ The report had been long and inconclusive and profoundly irritating. And now this big stupid fucktard had decided to crash the party. Literally. The poor beasts had nowhere to go once Trabia's Training Center had been blown to smithereens; they'd been left hanging around the rubble, hoping for some food. Apparently Trailer C had looked to the Rex like a gigantic Bite Bug Sandwich with extra mayo.

Quistis felt the anger rising in her blood and embraced it, willing it to come forth. She was angry as hell and wanted nothing more at this point than to watch the T-Rexaur vanish in a little puff of Blue Magic. Hell, she'd probably play with it for a little while just to watch it writhe. A little bit of something fire-related to warm up her goddamn feet before she went Degenerator on its ass. Hyne, her Blues were the best gift a girl could have...

Out of the corner of her eye she caught movement - a cadet running to her aid. "Hold up!" she snapped, gesturing; the cadet froze, eyes wide, as the Rex took a dangerous and nearly fatal swipe in his direction. Quistis's eyes fluttered as she briefly scanned her own magic; she drew back her energy, focusing, and finally let the Blind spell loose.

It caught. Quistis spared a glance at the stunned cadet. "Is everybody out of the trailer?"

He blinked and shook red hair from his eyes. "I - I don't know," he stammered.

"Go," Quistis ordered. The boy blinked; "I've got this covered," she growled, turning back to the beast and narrowing her eyes. The ground was cold and her toes were probably blue and her nipples were about to fall _off_ and she was surrounded with people who were stupid enough to run _toward_ a Rexaur without a Blind spell thirty seconds in front of them-

The final wall broke, and adrenaline and magic rushed through her veins. She closed her eyes in bliss, arching her back, arms crossed dangerously before her face, fingers outstretched with the magic itself. Quistis let the Fire Breath roar, feeling herself hiss like a dragon as the spell raked the Rex. The beast shrieked, but without its vision, it was fumbling blindly.

_Even the damn Rex can't put up a good fight._ Riding the magic high, Quistis sorted through her techniques - each the result of a dedicated study of some particular monster's ability. An academic to the last. The Rexaur roared and in a final burst of irritation she let Degenerator loose, swallowing the ugly beast into some dimension where - she could only hope - the bastard would run into Ultimecia.

The battle ended and she came out panting slightly, her clothes stuck to her body through a thin layer of sweat. She snapped the whip once, feeling a strong surge of satisfaction as it cracked. She then allowed herself to look at the destruction of Trailer C.

Damn that Sorceress. The only reason the Rexaurs were roaming free was that their Training-Center-cage had been destroyed in the blast. Quistis mentally ran through every curse word she'd ever heard and a few that, in a sudden creative fit, she and Xu had thought of back in their second year. Trabia didn't need any more destruction - any more setbacks at _all_. And neither did she.

With a resigned sigh, she broke out of her frozen stance, the adrenaline and stress seeping into her muscles, tightening them into knots. Damn. She shook her head absently, feeling wet hair gently slap her neck. The first thing she had to look for in this mess was something with long sleeves - as the battle-high faded, reality surfaced. And reality in Trabia was damn cold.

"Sweet Daughter of Hyne, Trepe," said a voice behind her, as something settled around her shoulders. Quistis jumped, startled, and she heard Headmaster Shain chuckle as he gently patted the dry towel around her shoulders and lifted his hands, palm out, as if calming a wild creature. "Quite a show. Think we could tempt you into Instructorship?"

She was not in the mood to joke, but she did appreciate the towel. "I'm only here to help," she shot back, muffled by the violent drying of her face. Once she had emerged from the towel, she straightened up, wrapping it around her shoulders like a shawl. "Anyone hurt?"

Shain shook his head. "Fortunately there was no one staying in Trailer C but you."

_Fortunate, yes - fortunate that I know how to deal with a Rex on my own._ She began to pick her way back toward the wreckage that used to be her comfortable room, looking for the suitcase she knew had a sweatshirt in it. She bent down quite ungracefully, her muscles tight with the aftermath of battle and Blue Magic, sifting through a pile of sodden papers she only assumed were hers.

"Stefen, Margo, help Trepe gather her belongings. Rahine and Tor - secure the area, please." Headmaster Shain paused, and Quistis looked up briefly to see his brilliant gaze scanning the crowd. "Jae, head back to my office and tell Cassie we have to file another incident report." Quistis paused as she realized that Shain knew every student by name. What an affectionate touch for a Headmaster. The word _crowd_ floated through her mind briefly, looking for something to connect with.

Stefen had located her suitcase, and Quistis dove for it gratefully; it had survived the attack in wholly decent condition. The top layer was soggy and chilled, but the top layer had been the soggy Seed uniform, so that wasn't much of a loss. She pulled out a thick gray sweater with _Balamb Garden_ across the front in blue and tugged it on over her head. The hood came up to hide the soggy mess of her hair. She turned to thank Shain - and the word _crowd_ finally caught up to her slowly thawing brain.

"Oh my," Quistis said aloud as she looked at the couple dozen students who had gathered in the clearing beside Trailer C's remains. The students were listening to Shain's orders with about 80-percent of their concentration; Quistis found herself the recipient of furtive glances containing admiration, disbelief, awe. She awkwardly adjusted the hood around her face as she sloshed across the ground to Shain's side (realizing belatedly that she hadn't removed the soggy slippers). 

Shain broke off mid-sentence and looked at her, smiling. "There's finally some color back in your face, Trepe," he said. "We were starting to worry."

"It's quite a _we_, Headmaster," Quistis returned under her breath. "Shouldn't the students have been running the _other_ way?"

Shain's face became slightly more serious. "Stefen hit the alarm after you told him you were taking on the Rex alone," he replied. "And Trabia has learned the importance of responding to an alarm."

An awkward silence settled for a moment where Quistis - suddenly and surprisingly - felt chastised. She looked out at the students, most of which suddenly became strongly interested in their feet. "I still admire the response," she said quietly.

"Come on, Investigator Trepe," Shain said with a grin, breaking the moment: "How often do the young SeeDs get the chance to see a brilliant and beautiful blonde take on a T-Rexaur in her pajamas?"

Quistis tried to giggle nervously, but failed as usual (her sarcastic snort was well-known). "Why do I feel like the center of attention?"

"You should be used to that, Trepe," Shain murmured under his breath. "Devon - gather up a ten-pack and prepare to start damage control directly after we get Miss Trepe's affairs in order."

Quistis delicately chose to ignore Shain's comment. "What can I do, Headmaster?"

"Go see Cass and warm up," he replied. "Trabia's used to damage control - and besides, you've done enough for today."

Sensing her hesitation, he placed a firm hand on her back and gave her a gentle shove. "That's an order, Quistis. Go put on a pot of coffee, would you? I'll need it."

"Yes, sir," she said with barely a hint of sarcasm.

Quistis let herself into the main trailer which housed Shain's office and located the coffeepot; the coffee itself proved slightly more difficult, but with Cassie's help she located Shain's secret stash ("Oh goody," said Cassie with an evil grin, "this is the good stuff") and set the pot going. Quistis relaxed into the chair in the corner of Shain's office, a big padded leather deal with an extendable footrest. The coffeepot gurgled happily and Quistis felt a sudden wave of relaxation. Maybe it was exhaustion. At this point in her life, the two were easily confused. Her eyelids fluttered. She was _warm_.

"Agent Trepe?" Cassie's voice chirped from the hallway. "I've found it."

"Excuse me?" Quistis asked, her voice vague with confusion.

Cassie wheeled herself around the corner, a stack of printouts on her lap. "Well, I cross-referenced Elsevier for you earlier this afternoon. Just did a broad search on the network, gathered some general information using the Garden search engine."

"Wow," Quistis said, trying to gather the energy necessary to sit up. "Thanks, Cass."

"Well, Shain suggested it, and he's horrible with computers, so I did it," the girl replied. "He's not as bad as he looks - not like that's bad at all," she said with another wicked grin. Quistis chuckled.

"Anyway, I don't know if it will be helpful at all, but here you go." She held out the stack of papers and Quistis took it with a grateful smile.

"Background information always helps," she said, rearranging herself in the grand chair. She eventually curled up in the chair, tucking her long legs almost beneath her and resting the stack on her thighs. She had every intention of attempting to nap again, but she was touched by Cassie's work, and figured she'd give the information an attempt.

But as her eyes briefly scanned the paper, she found herself intrigued. Cassie had downloaded a bunch of information from the public Elsevier website - the usual political nonsense expected by a research facility. _Here at Elsevier, knowledge is number one,_ and other such precious descriptive gems. There were links to the major inventions Elsevier had copyrighted or patented - the kind of things Odine would have rattled off without a thought (and Zell would have had trouble pronouncing correctly). The information was actually relatively bland, which surprised her; she read on.

Next was a sample paper Cassie had downloaded: _The Principles of Neomagic and their Relation to Source Magic._ Quistis had read something by the same authors in her own experience at Garden; she remembered it being something equivalent to a load of hogwash. This paper was an eloquently written statement on the development of neomagic and its inherent flaws, something Quistis had been interested in at the beginning of her studies. Her quick eyes began to devour the paper in front of her.

The authors were arguing that neomagic - the physical manifestation of magic, manufactured by the earth and its monsters and harvested by humans - was a weak, cheap imitation of the more vague spiritual powers of sorceresses. Because neomagic was a technique _designed_ by humans, they argued, instead of a naturally occurring force of nature, neomagic was weak. Quistis wasn't sure of the wisdom of this argument coming from a scientific research community who made its living designing neomagic-related research. It made an interesting viewpoint nonetheless.

_For example, consider a well-trained Sorceress and a well-trained Neomage. Because the Neomage must obtain his magical powers externally, he lacks the advantage of the Sorceress. The Sorceress can generate her powers at will, wherever and whenever she wishes, whereas the Neomage is dependent on the availability of his magic and his own performance strategy. A Neomage consumes, whereas a Sorceress generates._ And more of the same.

Quistis tapped her fingers on the paper in thought. Elsevier certainly held the Sorceresses in high respect. But what would make them lean so far as to act against Garden? Garden was a passive threat - designed to protect and defend. It wasn't as if Garden was out hunting the Sorceresses actively...

The next section made her sit up straight in her chair. It was the log of a political journal, dated perhaps six months ago. _Neomagic Branch Breaks from Elsevier,_ read the headline, followed by _Are the others far behind?_ Apparently one of the research branches, based in Argun (a city-suburb of Esthar), had split from the central organization of Elsevier, citing the business-related version of "artistic differences". A rogue branch...

Her fingers drummed a rigid beat. So now she had an idea. A rogue branch of a scientific organization - with the publicity and funding from said scientific organization - led by some misguided twit who had decided that Garden was an enemy. Oh goody.

  
  


_The existence of the Sorceress has been central to much of the controversy and conflict in modern history. Do those who defend - even worship - Sorceresses have a right to express and practice their beliefs? Yes, practice - with questionable research money. The Argun Southern Chapter, formerly of Elsevier Science Inc., led by D'hun Dregatta, has severed all legal ties to their parent company (said Elsevier Science), citing discriminatory events. Argun Southern has threatened legal action, but has yet to make any claims._

_"Many of us find ourselves in this field of research because of our beliefs," said an unidentified research assistant. "You follow the things you're passionate about. Environmentalists go into conservation because they believe in the life of the Planet. Many of us have taken this path because we believe something - a lot like that. Are you going to throw us all in jail because there's a connection between belief and business? Bankers believe in money, soldiers believe in war. It's the same thing."_

_However, President Dregatta cites otherwise. "Scientists with dreams are little better than dreamers. I have no quarrel with beliefs - but beliefs do not belong in the laboratory. These men and women are wasting government grants on personal pet projects when they should be using the money on very specific problems. This is illegal - and also wrong."_

  
  


Quistis sighed. What _were_ the beliefs? No where in the article did it take even a moment to talk about what was actually behind this ... revolt. Quotes with no substance and phrases with no context. She never would have let something like this pass through _her_ class. Journalism school apparently was where Garden drop-outs ended up.

"What has you so engrossed?"

  
  
  
  


But would this branch still go by the Elsevier name? Or was it the _larger_ organization that was involved? Or was the smaller branch trying to _frame_ the larger? Or a third party, who had closed in on this as a perfect scapegoat, knowing it would get someone like her tangled and twisted in politics while they called the shots from some abandoned treehouse... All they had was a name. A _name_. And a city now. It was better than a shot in the dark; even Irvine didn't have night vision...

"Um."

She looked up, startled. Shain was standing there, pants soaked to the knees, his nose bright red from the cold. She noticed that he had helped himself to the coffee - _when did I miss that?_ - and that his fingers were curled around the cup like a lizard on a sun-covered rock.

She grinned, sheepishly. "Sorry about that."

"Lost in dream land?"

"I wish," she said almost ruefully. "Cassie pulled some things off the 'net for me," she said, glancing back at the paper. If the Elsevier lead were only true...

"Ah, the computer whiz at work," he said, heading for his desk.

"You know," Quistis mused, "Selphie's good with computers, too. Is it a Trabian thing?"

"Computers are huge here," Shain replied. "We're out in the middle of nowhere - it's the only way for most people to keep in contact. Phones are expensive, letters take too long. Net is cheap and easy."

"Huh." She thought for a second.

"So what did she find for you?"

Quistis smirked at the paper. "A lead, I think. I'm not sure. But if Elsevier is really connected with this - the name, I mean - I think I know where to look."

"What do you mean, 'the name'? You think someone's just tossing titles around?"

He was quick, she admitted. "Well, there was a split in policy a little while back - one branch declared itself independent. It had a lot to do with Sorceress ideology, apparently. I'm hoping someone there can give me answers."

"So you're really asking me to order you a train ticket."

Quistis bristled. "I know how to do it."

He laughed. "I know, but Headmasters get privilege. I can get you out this afternoon if you've already overstayed your welcome."

"No offense, Headmaster, but I'm not here for the welcome."

He nodded and turned to the computer. "Aptly put. Where to?"

She flipped through the paper. "Argun Station, Esthar?"

"Oh, Hyne, Quistis," Shain said abruptly, pulling back from the computer and looking her directly in the eye. His scrutiny made her nervous; she caught herself chewing on her bottom lip. 

"What?" she asked finally, more bluntly than she wanted. "Why is that some horrible breach of etiquette?"

"You've never heard of it," Shain said almost incredulously. "Bloody Ifrit, Quistis. Argun is the low-life capital of the world. It's a hell of a dirty city - it's the _gutter_. Thick with traitors and thieves."

"Sounds exactly like what I want," she said deliberately. Who did he think he was? He certainly wasn't her boss. And although he was taller, she had the feeling that his in-the-field experience was lacking. In a fight between the two of them, the odds were on herself, and she wasn't the betting type.

"No, Quistis. Look. Send in a squad, an agent. You've got the money. Don't dive in there yourself."

She blinked. "Excuse me?"

Shain, to her surprise, stood up and stared her down over the desk. "This is a mess, Trepe," he said strictly. "Pure ghetto. You walk in there with your blond hair and your heels and your pretty little face and you'll be gone before you can blink."

"Do you believe me unable to handle myself - Headmaster?" Part of her was seething with rage at the fact that Shain would _dare_ presume that _she, Quistis Trepe,_ was in danger from anything less than Ultimecia's wicked stepmother. The other part of her was seething with rage at the fact that she was getting a little nervous. 

"I am giving you a friendly warning - Instructor." There was nothing friendly about his voice any more; Quistis noted that his eyes had an uncanny spark in them. Concern? Fear? Insolent prat.

"Warning taken, Headmaster," she snapped, and then bit her lip: it was still bad form for her to insult a Headmaster. Even if she was trying to be one, eventually. Especially if she was trying to be one.

"Quistis," Shain said, with a little more emotion in his voice. "Look. I've read your file. I know you're qualified. But - Argun doesn't play by anybody's rules. Don't go alone."

"I have to go alone," she replied.

"Don't go too deep, then."

Straightening to her full height, she looked him right in the face, a daring move even for her, and something in his shining eyes struck her. A wave of heat swept up from her belly through her heart and settled into her cheeks momentarily. No, she thought. I'm not going off this lead because some good-looking man made puppy-dog eyes at me.

She buried the rush as she turned to (unnecessarily) arrange the stack of papers. "I will be fine," she said, and told herself that she _didn't_ sound like petulant, four-year-old Squall.

"You'd better be," he said, but the intensity was gone; his voice was joking once more. "Who's gonna save us from the next T-Rex if you're not?"

She tucked golden hair behind her ear. "I'll be going now - thank you for your hospitality."

"Oh, wait." He sighed, running a hand through his hair, messily. "I'll get you that ticket. Tomorrow morning, then?"

The Headmaster arranged both a train ticket into Esthar and a cab ride to the station. Tucked safely away in Trailer B (well, she hoped it was safe), Quistis separated her stack of papers into neat little piles on the bed. The report from Xu, underlined and cross-referenced. The stack from Cassie, divided into archives even Ambrosia would have been proud of. Filed, even without a filing cabinet. Queen Quistis reigned over a paper kingdom.

She sighed. She was still fuming at Shain, both for her comments and because he had actually made her rethink her own abilities. If she could take a Rexaur, she could handle herself in the gutter of Esthar, right? It was almost an insult.

She thought back. So far, everyone who had been trying to 'help' her (Maxus, Shain) had ended up driving her crazy. She worked best alone for this very reason; no emotions, no pretensions, just simple facts. Answers. Now that she was alone, maybe she could get her thoughts straight.

Something was driving her towards Esthar. Somewhere in Argun, this dirty city, this gutter, was _something_ she was looking for. Some sort of organization using Elsevier's name that was pro-Sorceress to the devotional point of being anti-Garden. Her brain tweaked at the thought - there was something she should do before she left. Instinct alone prodded her, the feeling of something magnetic gathering behind her eyes. Quistis skimmed her eyes over the papers, trying to determine exactly what the feeling was pointing to. She picked up the small phone, dialed Balamb Garden.

"Hello?"

"Commander Leonhart's extension, please." Her voice was calm.

There was a soft click as the call was redirected, and then Squall's low _whatever_ voice came over the line. "Leonhart."

"Trepe," she said as a greeting. "How's Balamb?"

"Same," Squall said. "Selphie's gone nutters over the Festival, Irvine's got some secret up his pants, and Zell - is Zell. How's the mission?"

He managed to be so flat in his delivery that it took Quistis a moment to realize that Squall was being sarcastic. "Interesting so far." She paused, trying to put the magnetic feeling into words. "Look, Squall, I've got a bad feeling about - something."

"Is everything alright?" She heard him shift. "Mission in jeopardy?"

"No, no," she reassured him. "It's not that at all. Look - is Rinoa there?"

This time there was a long pause before he responded. "Not 'here' in this room, but 'here' in Garden, yes."

The instinct and the magnetic feeling seemed to pulse, as if in response. "I've uncovered something interesting," she began, not wanting to divulge too much of her discovery (in case it was a dead end). "It's not a big deal - but there are hints that there's a faction out there who wants to get their hands on Sorceresses."

She wouldn't have heard Squall's breath had she not been listening for it. "Continue."

"Hints of a pro-Sorceress faction, but it's about as nutters as Selphie," she said dryly. "They're pro-Sorceress _powers_ - they want to _use_ them. I don't want to raise a false alarm - I just want to - well, keep an eye on Rinoa for the time being. And Ellone too, for that matter. Where is she?"

"Elle? Out on her ship, traveling the world and caring for orphans," Squall said. "But I'll call her just in case."

"Really, Squall," Quistis said seriously. "Don't make it official - just between you and me, alright? Something's not really right here, and it won't hurt to keep your eyes open."

Squall let another moment drag along before he said, "Will do." And anonther pause, and then; "Thanks, Quistis."

Against all odds, she smiled into the phone. "Trepe out," she said and disconnected.

  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  


_Cameos from Hitchhiker's Guide as well as a reference to Robin McKinley's The Hero and the Crown in the last chapter that I forgot to credit. Don't want sued for creative borrowing._

  
  


_Sorry for the absence. I hate unfinished stories, so you'll have to take my word that this one will reach a conclusion. It's not entirely my 'type' of fiction per se, but now that the idea is in my head I do aim to finish. My writing is usually much more fantasy-oriented than either 'Gold' or 'Sincerity Cowboy' are. This is like the practice run with the characters before I dive into the massive project I have planned after I finish this one ... _

  
  


_Anyway. I'll try to be a little more rigorous with my schedule. If you're still reading, drop me a line and let me know ... I'd appreciate it..._


	7. The Wisdom of Fools

_Another long hiatus. I've rearranged my schedule to try and provide some more time for myself in general. This should include writing. This chapter was kind of a doozy to write anyway. Lots of things happen. _

_Hopefully the next will be back sooner._

_Seventhe_

A Shine Like Gold

Chapter Seven: The Wisdom of Fools

_Hyne_, this was a dirty city.

Quistis curled her arms around herself involuntarily. It wasn't cold in the sense of Trabian cold - it was the cold of _chill_, an emotional wasteland. She sensed almost immediately that she would never find a warm soul - if she could find her way out again. Quistis had always prided organization above everything else. To an untrained eye, yes, her office looked _busy_ - but everything had a proper place and, more importantly, was _in it._ No matter what excuses you made clutter was clutter and Quistis was in the middle of a mess. Literally.

It felt as if there were a permanent haze of grit between her eyes and the rest of the world. She hated to admit it, because it felt like defeat; she was always looking for the good and noble parts in everything. Plus, it meant that Shain had been right.

Why would a (relatively) upstanding research community like Elsevier found a branch in this hole in the ground? Easy, cheap grunt labour, she thought. Reclusive. No journalist or politician is going to hunt you down in this mess. Plus, what a motivational view.

It had taken her a couple of minutes to adjust her eyes to the strange cloud that seemed to hang like a curtain over the city - much like Esthar's shield, except gone wrong. Argun looked like the drain through which everything washed out of Esthar and into the desert and wasteland. Bits and pieces of grit and grime and occasionally humanity got stuck in old streets and broken-down buildings. Occasionally cultures grew like mold between the cracks. 

She had been rather uneasy about finding a hotel room. The second she got off the train the wind of desolation hit her and she realized just what kind of city this was - the kind that everyone reads about all the time and thinks they know about, but really don't, at least not until they visit. It was also the kind of city that nobody really visited. They ended up here. They were swept here. Down the drain from Esthar.

So Quistis had grabbed the first hotel room she could find in the first hotel she could find - meaning, the first hotel to have a sign which was legible from ten feet away. The hotel was dingy and dark and gritty as well, but it had walls - almost like protection. She'd gone to hook her computer up to the wall only to notice that the phone jack had been torn out of its socket. She dug out her (unused) lock and chained the laptop to the bed.

She had left most of her things in Trabia, electing to bring only a small daybag with essentials and her briefcase. She'd worn her battle-gear. She didn't think Argun was the kind of city where you tried to look nice anyway. No ballgowns here. Not as if she owned one, anyway.

Her hotel was in what she assumed could be called the 'upstanding part of town' - the sidewalks and the roads were actually two different colors. She'd asked the young woman at the hotel desk where she could find the research facility. The woman had said something in a very heavy Estharian accent and gestured down the road. So Quistis went.

Her trained eyes noticed that she wasn't the only one armed.

As she walked her disconnected mind began to put the pieces together. Esthar's brilliance had to have come from somewhere. She noticed empty warehouses, abandoned factories, broken-down nuclide plants. Argun had been a step along the road of Esthar's development. She knew the city ran completely off of solar now; so if Argun had been developed during the nuclide age, that made it one of the earliest. Which made sense. Argun was dead and still dying at the same time.

Her road connected to another road; at the corner, she offered the man with the guitar some money and got directions to the Argun Southern Center of Elsevier Science Inc. Take this road here down two blocks, then take this other road, you won't miss it, thank you ma'am. The Argun Center, he called it, with a glint in his eye. She didn't like glints.

As she walked her brisk pace down the road, she wondered what she would say to Shain. Yeah, Argun looked like the garbage dump, but look at me, I'm okay? She wondered if Squall would have expressed the same (slightly degrading) concern, or if he would have just let her go. Why were Shain's words eating at her - that look on his face?

She shook her head slightly. _She_ was in charge of this mission. She wasn't here because being a Headmaster had been dangled in front of her on a stick. There were terrorists and saboteurs out there - and this was something she could take care of.

She rounded the corner, and her eyes fell upon what could only be the Argun Center. Her hopes immediately crashed. This place was a _wreck_ - even worse than its surroundings, and that meant something in Argun. It slightly resembled Trabia Garden after the bombing. 

Hesitantly (and mentally curling her hand around her whip's handle), she approached the complex. Miraculously, it still had power; she could see the dim golden glow of nuclide lamps through the cracks in the glass door. She hesitantly pushed it open.

A rustle in front of her - she leapt through the door, threw her back against the nearest wall, and flashed her arm out before her, ready to summon up a spell; the other hand had flown to the hook on her belt on which her whip rested. A voice chuckled. The chuckle was dirty and gritty just like the building, just like Argun. Her blood raced.

"You're a jumpy one," the voice said. Her eyes were beginning to adjust to the dimmer light, and she could see - a desk? Yes, a desk. A receptionist's desk. With a small lamp glowing nuclide golden, and a plant, and a stack of papers. She even saw a can of soda.

"But we often get the jumpy ones in this city," it continued. She saw the figure behind the desk now. Male, slight build, hunched shoulders. Her eyes strained to track his moves, wondering if the Barrier spell on her fingertips would be faster than the gun he could pull from - pretty much anywhere.

"May I help you, my dear?" There was a venom on his voice that she did _not_ like. For the moment she deigned to lower her casting arm and peered at him. Yes, tall, and dark. Thin, with squinty eyes. Too typical of this city. Her alarms were all blaring, but the detached part of her mind began to notice things. He wasn't looking at her as if she were a threat. He was looking at her as if she were (her eyes focused) a panicked young woman, lost in a dirty city. Well, that was a part she could play, if only to buy herself time. Time before what?

"I -" she panted a little. "The building looked totally empty - I'm sorry, sir, you scared me."

He nodded as if he scared young women on a daily basis. From the looks of his teeth, he probably did. "A caster, are you? Young. Magic-trained?"

_Shit._ But she'd known that in a place like Elsevier they'd know all about magic. They'd probably even have a thing or two to tell her about her Blues. Magic trained - _wait_. A couple pieces fell in place, and a plan appeared.

Calmly Quistis lowered her arm the rest of the way and said in what she hoped was a tentative voice, "I'm from Garden."

She was watching for it, so she saw it: the man's eyes blazed up with expectation. "I thought as much," he said, the venom now greedy. "Come to join our ranks?"

This was more than she was hoping for. "Maybe," she said cautiously. "I'm actually looking for the man they call Grey."

The blaze was smothered by suspicion. Her mind noted each and every emotion. "Why are you looking for him, little girl?" The man leant conspiratorially over the desk. "He eats little girls for lunch."

Quistis managed to look duly shaken, although inside she was noting in triumph, Aha. So there _is_ someone in this organization who goes by that name, and who would be very interested in young cadets from Garden. "I - I have a message for him."

There, the cards were on the table. She'd placed a couple of very important bets. First, that she was in the right place - that this Elsevier was involved with the one she was looking for. Second, that Garden was important enough to her Elsevier that it could get her through security. Third, that she could pass for a timid Garden novice and not seem like a threat. And fourth, that all of her other assumptions were right and this man wasn't going to shoot her on sight.

The fact that the man had recognized the name Grey meant that Assumption Number One was probably correct. And there was no barrel pointed at her face, so Number Four seemed okay. For now. He was looking at her now, his eyes fighting hers for information. Quistis put on her best Timid Cadet costume and waited.

The man stood up. "How much do you know about Grey?"

Quistis bit her lip, trying to buy herself time. How much did she know? "Not much," she ventured. Hyne, she was almost enjoying the game. "I just - I need to tell him something." And then, to confirm Number One: "Am I in the right place?"

"Grey isn't here." He walked around from behind the desk, and Quistis tried hard to look intimidated (instead of being intimidating, which she had more practice at). "He's never here. We never see him. He is far too important."

"Um." Her mind raced. "Where is he then?"

The man walked right up to her and looked her in the eyes. It was the kind of look that was supposed to dive deep into your soul and scare you. For a moment Quistis panicked: she was too tall for this, she stood too straight, the man would see right through the facade and discover her. But being tall was ingrained in her soul, she couldn't slouch, she just _couldn't_...

She was trying. And he could see she was trying at something, but he thought she was simply trying to be brave. He looked away, walked across the room.

"Grey is the man who leads us. He is the one who gives us the directions."

"Okay," Quistis said. _But where is he?_

"No one talks with the leader."

"But - but I need to." 

He turned back to her. "What is so urgent?"

Bet Number Two surfaced. "I can't tell you," she said. "I have to - I can only tell Grey." 

The man shook his head. "I can take you to someone who will listen," he said. "Someone who speaks with Grey."

Quistis's trained ears caught a lie. 

She tried to filter through the words to figure out what was wrong. Her alarms had gone off again. Had they figured her out already? Were they taking her to jail? She weighed the unknown dangers of following the man with the chances that it would get her somewhere.

But she was already too far in. She'd have to see what they were going to give her. She could handle it. If they thought they were going to take her in the back and slit her throat, then they'd be surprised when they tried it.

"Okay," she said.

The man turned and opened a door, gesturing for her to follow as he headed down a hallway. The entire thing was lit with the nuclide lamps; Quistis hadn't seen nuclide since her childhood. Their old vacation home, a house on a lake somewhere, had been lit with nuclide. Golden. The man's shoes made little click-click noises. She tried to remember to make noise herself.

As they walked she tossed the facts around in her mind, hoping a plausible story would emerge. Young girl from Garden, sent to the boss, with some sort of urgent news. The Kinneas-Tilmitt mission. Botched cover. Bingo.

What had the girl's name been? Vanesa. Thank Hyne for Xu's thorough reports. She'd have to play Vanesa's best friend. Or not even. Vanesa's other friend, who didn't know as much. Then she could get some background. Everything fell together. 

"So," she said in a voice she only hoped was timid, "How fast can I get a message to Grey?"

The man only grunted. "I don't know."

Quistis guessed that avenue of information had been closed. The man had seen something in her - suspicious or urgent, she didn't know - and was pawning her off on the higher authorities. Higher was good, though. As long as the higher authorities didn't turn out to be Ultimecia's wicked stepmother. 

He opened the door to what looked like a small office. Another man sat behind a desk; he looked up abruptly as the door opened. This man was a little bit stocky, kind of like Cid, but instead of looking dumb and kind he looked dumb and sinister.

"She's here from Garden," the first man said to the second man, and at the look on the second man's face Quistis felt the first little chill of panic run up her spine.

"Thank you," said the second man; he stood up more gracefully than she would have expected and closed the door as the first man left. This new friend looked fat and poisonous, like a chubby slow snake that would prefer to squeeze its prey rather than chase it. Her mind detached and whirring, Quistis did the calculations and adjusted the game accordingly. She replaced the look of fear on her face with one of admiration: the Flatter the Fat Man game, one that worked all too well.

"Yes, calm down," Fat said, and smiled. His smile looked like a snake too. "You're safe here. Nordic can be a bit - intense. But that's security's job."

His condescending tone made her want to vomit, or unleash Shockwave Pulsar, or maybe both. "Have a seat," he said, and gestured to a chair behind her with faintly gross upholstery. Quistis sat, and looked at him.

"You say you're from Garden?" he asked.

Flatter the Fat Man, she thought. "Are you Grey?" she asked, trying to sound scared and incredulous all at once.

Fat laughed, obviously pleased. "No, not at all, girly. My name is Dulle, and I'm Director of Security Recruitment. Basically, my job is to find young folks like you with a good head on their shoulders who believe in something more than money, and open their eyes to what we stand for."

Slightly confused; "I - I have a message for Grey, I'm not here to... well, maybe... I need to talk to Grey, I was told to talk only to him..."

Fat's eyes gleamed, a snake sighting his prey. "Your message is safe with me, sweetie. From me it will go straight to my supervisor, who is Director of Recruitment, and one of the few who has ever spoken to Grey in person."

"You don't know who he is?"

Fat bristled. "Of course I do! He is just - not readily available. Someone as genius and as valuable as Grey must be kept safe. It's ingenious, really - not even under the severest of tortures can I give away my leader." He looked almost proud, and Quistis saw the first indication: a blind, mindless follower, lulled into obedience by a false sense of belonging. This she could milk for all she was worth.

"So... Grey keeps himself safe by never meeting anyone?"

Fat nodded eagerly. "Those who cannot trust in him do not belong in our ranks," he said.

Quistis bit her bottom lip. A look of sadness and regret flickered across her face, slow enough that Dulle the Dumpling would catch it. "I need to speak with him," she whispered.

Fat folded his hands and looked at her, his eyes alight with fervor. "You can't, my dear, but may I -"

He didn't finish, because Quistis leapt out of her seat, her hands clenched. "I promised! I promised her I would only tell him! I told her, I swore I'd tell him about -" One hand flew to her mouth, her eyes wide, her voice clamping down on the words. Fat's eyes lit on fire as they narrowed.

And for a second Quistis thought she had blown it - here she was, standing before this man: one of the six most famous SeeDs, wearing the battle gear she had worn to defeat Ultimecia. But there was no recognition in his eyes, and she remembered that the picture of her that had been splashed across the 'net and the telecom was one of her in her glasses and SeeD uniform, looking serious and tall and old. He was looking at her as if he had found a treasure.

"You promised _who,_ _what?_"

Quistis sat back down, her eyes still wide. "Vanesa," she whispered; as she lay her last card on the table.

"What relation are you to her?" he said, his eyes narrow, his voice sharp. The snake was waking up.

"She didn't tell me - she didn't tell me anything!" Her voice was fervent. "She only said that she was going to do something she believed was right, and if anything happened to her, that I should come here and ask for Grey and tell him..."

"Tell him what?" Each word was a hiss, a punctuated arrow. 

"I promised her," Quistis whispered. "I promised I would tell only him. And she's gone now..."

She dropped her eyes to her lap, not wanting to watch as her gamble won or lost. She could almost feel his slow thick thoughts permeating the room. 

"You look very upset," his voice began, low and honey-coated.

She looked up, surprised, and blinked.

"Can you tell me what happened to your friend?"

She swallowed. "They took her," she said.

Fat leaned forward over his desk. "What happened to her," he asked almost gently.

"They - they framed her," she continued. "Her and her boyfriend. They trapped her in some mission and sent her to the Desert Prison. Hurt her really bad, too," she added, her mind flickering across the line in Xu's report about Selphie's violent Quezacotl reaction. "And now she's gone, and all I have is this promise." She clenched her fists again, staring down at them. "I have to keep it."

"You must be furious," the man continued, and Quistis managed to not blink in surprise.

"I am," she replied, curious but willing to play his game nonetheless.

"Would you like to avenge your friend?"

Oh, it couldn't be this easy. Quistis allowed a fire to light her own eyes and hissed, "Yes, I would."

"I could make you a trade," Fat said, and her heart leapt. "I am not in a powerless position, as you may think."

"No, sir," she said timidly.

"I am, in fact, partial to key information. Information that can help you."

"Of course, sir." Quistis saw the bruised ego and decided to milk it. Fat wanted to prove his worth to her, and so she would let him.

"Elsevier is a broken organization," he began, taking a deep breath as if to prepare himself, and Quistis leant forward, eagerly soaking in the information. Finally! Fat folded his hands on the desk before him, and said suddenly, "What's your name, child?"

"Athaena," she said quietly. Only a small fib. _Quistis Athaena Trepe._

"Well," he said, smiling back. "Athaena. Elsevier once was the leading organization in magical research. I do not mean neo-magic, the science you learn in your studies. Pure, unadulterated, unrefined magic. _Real_ magic. We looked for the Sorceresses, and for their powers, and for the uses of their powers. And we found an answer."

His face and voice grew more passionate as he spoke. "We are the only people who understand," he said. "Let me ask you a question, Athaena. If you knew of a power so great, so wonderful, that it could heal all of the problems of this world, wouldn't you want to use it to help people?"

Quistis nodded, eagerly.

"What if you yourself could not use this power, but you knew someone who could?" he asked then. "Someone who could right evils, cure diseases, heal the earth and the seas? Someone who was willing to do this? Would you believe in them? Would you help them complete this task, protect them as they did it?"

He paused, and she went to nod, but then he continued violently: "Or would you lock them away, seal them and send them to outer space, even _kill_ them, because you are afraid of their powers?"

And Quistis understood - finally. This branch of Elsevier had gone mad. This was _Adel_ they were speaking of, as if she was a benevolent fairy, some sort of angel who would content herself with sprinkling rain on a farmer's land or healing a plagued village. She wondered if Adel could even lay claim to a single healing spell.

And then she remembered Rinoa's new limit break: the one she had called Angel Wing, a young girl's desperate attempt to make light out of darkness. Yes, Rinoa erupted in light and stars and feathers and emerged with luminous wings - but in that state, the sorceress could access only her darkest magic, cast only the spells created for pain. Not all beings with wings are Angels.

But Fat was looking at her, awaiting an answer, and Quistis nodded slowly, knowing something was expected of her. "What powers are you talking about?" she asked. "Has no one else discovered a power this great?"

Fat grinned at her, his teeth gleaming. "Of course they have. But they fear it, they lock it away, they wage wars against it. And those who bear these powers are forced to defend themselves, to use them for evil rather than for good. Would you protect these powers?" Fat fingers drummed a quick salute on his desk.

"What I offer you is this," he said, leaning even father over his desk. "This is a chance to save your friend - to retaliate against the brutal forces who have punished her for doing what she thought was right. It's a chance to be a part of something bigger. Join us - sign your name to our ranks. We could use someone of your training and talent. You would work directly under me, I could arrange it." And something darker flashed into his eyes for a second; something Quistis chose to ignore with a deep shudder.

"I - I haven't graduated," she said, stalling, waiting to see what would be offered.

A thick smile spread over Fat's face. "And I will tell you where you can find Grey."

Her eyes flew wide, and this time she wasn't pretending - this was ten times better than she had hoped. "Really?" she whispered, gratitude spreading across her face.

"I can understand about promises made," Fat said. "And your intense desire to keep this one makes me believe that you could be that devoted to something else as well."

Quistis flicked her eyes down and back. "How - how do you know where to find Grey?"

Fat wriggled proudly in his seat, trying to sit up straight. "My supervisor told me," he said. Suddenly hesitant: "I don't know exactly. But I know where he can be found with very little searching."

"You swear?" she asked, direct and fierce. She didn't want to be led on a wild chase by some fat man in a suit.

"Yes," Dulle said, his eyes bright. "My supervisor let it slip once, and he is never wrong. Sign with us, and I will direct you to Grey, and you can keep your word to your friend."

"What do I need to do?"

From that moment on it was easier than anything. Fat gave her a large stack of papers which required identification and your birth certificate (ha, she didn't have one anyway, orphans didn't get them) and your signature beneath seventeen heady paragraphs about belief in Sorceress's Deity and other Random Bullshit. Quistis took them eagerly: Evidence.

Then Dulle proudly directed her to a row of apartment complexes. He even drew a map. "Grey's hideout is in one of these," he said . "Top floor, where he can see all of Argun. He is always moving between apartments, but he cannot leave the city, for his people are here. You will know him when you see him: he wears a grey coat, which is what gives him his name."

Quistis pictured a tall man in a dark coat and a fedora, someone out of a sleuth movie, and tried not to giggle. Instead, she gave Fat an incredulous gaze, which he just soaked up. "How did you learn this?"

"My supervisor learnt it from someone and told me," Fat said. "A few people know it. We all keep an eye on it - protect it from people who would do our leader harm."

And so Quistis headed out into the dusty dirt of Argun, fueled with her clues and her recent success, high on her ability to manipulate fat men. She walked to the apartment complex - also dusty and dirty, and spotted with seedy bars - and stared up at it, as if her problem was solved.

By the end of the day she was fuming.

The apartments were pieces of junk or worse. No one sane would live here, she thought, especially not the head of a huge terrorist organization. And yet: desperate, she had entered one of the bars and asked casually for the man called Grey. Everyone there said he was in one of the buildings as well.

Confused beyond belief, Quistis went back to her grungy hotel room and slept. She woke up three hours later to the tune of squeaky bedsprings and a slamming headboard. Stuffing a pillow over her head, she grimaced: of course she would pick the kind of hotel that rented _by the hour_.

The next day she awoke early and went hunting again - first for a cup of coffee. She bought one from a street vendor with a cart full of day-old pastries. The coffee still had grounds in the bottom. More caffeine for my money, she thought with a laugh as bitter as the dregs, and downed the cup.

Then she headed back to the apartments. A little less distracted and a little more focused, she quickly skimmed the two buildings she had covered, confirming their lack of grey coats. She moved on to a third, wandering into the lobby as if she lived there herself; she took the elevator straight to the top and worked her way down. Nothing, although an elderly lady commented on seeing a man in a grey coat the week previous. "He had visitors often," she said. "He was never alone. He wasn't here long, was he, dearie? Would you like a cup of tea?"

Smiling grimly, Quistis declined.

At the fourth building, she hit paydirt.

"A man in a grey coat - couldn't be more specific, could you, baby?"

The receptionist was eyeing her. Quistis clenched a fist. "I mean a _noticeable_ grey coat."

He bit his tongue and she slammed some money down on the desk. "He stole my stuff," she said randomly, "the bastard. Let me know where he is."

"There was a guy came in a little while ago," he said to her cleavage, "with a couple other guys - a big guy and a little guy, since you like descriptions. Big and little guys came out a while ago. Long grey coat - must be upstairs somewhere."

Quistis took off.

She gathered her thoughts in the elevator. Continue to play Stupid SeeD Girl? Or should she just jump in and take prisoners? Her GFs were brimming with anxious energy, as were her muscles; she knew she'd be a match for three men. She guessed. There was a sound - even the _ding_ of the elevator was somehow dirty - and the doors opened before she had a chance to make up her mind.

She took one cautious, silent step out, and scanned the area both with her eyes and her mind. (Siren, finding no hidden Drawpoint treasures, sighed sulkily and went back to sleep.) She was standing in the middle of the hall, barely breathing, when she heard it: a slight muffled curse, around the corner to the left.

She took another cautious, silent step towards the noise, everything she had ever heard about stealth fresh in her mind. Paused again. Nothing. She noticed that Save the Queen was already in her hand, and sighed; so much for Stupid SeeD Girl. Not even a street junkie could mistake Save the Queen for a beginner's weapon. Everything about the whip screamed Expert. And Death.

Her choice being made for her by her instincts, Quistis took the last couple steps toward the end of the hall as silently as she could. She then braced herself, thinking rapidly, detachedly. With the hallways this long, she would have to throw herself around and then flatten against the next wall, in case whoever was up here had a gun. Too bad she hadn't thought of a Protect spell, but casting now would be a dead giveaway. She'd have a couple seconds of surprise during which she could judge the threat. She didn't want to waste a spell on another old lady tea junkie anyway.

And with expert poise, Quistis peeled herself away from the wall, whirling so quickly around the corner that even she was impressed, her whip already snapping upwards to interrupt any threats that were a little too close to home. Her eyes trailed the ground momentarily to calculate her safety zone, and then they flicked upwards and landed on Seifer Almasy's face.

Quistis's shock was so strong that she forgot all about poise and expertise and slammed into the wall across the hall. Her shoulder would be bruised from that, some part of her mind distantly pointed out. She noticed that Save the Queen had wrapped itself around a very familiar blade. Gunblade. Hyperion.

Of course it's familiar. You trained it, you idiot. You trained the man who is about to kill you.

Like hell he's about to kill me, Quistis thought, giving her whip a quick tug - yes, Hyperion was secure. For now. But her whip was occupied. They were at a stalemate, she and Seifer.

She noticed briefly that Seifer had looked just as shocked at the sight of her face. Seifer. Seifer Almasy, her old student. Seifer was here, hiding out in the top floor of an apartment building - strange place to run into - 

Grey coat - 

No.

"Fancy meeting you here, Instructor," he said in a cold voice, with a sneer that seemed to light every nerve on fire.


	8. The Force of Instinct

_Well, aha. Are there people who think they have figured it out? Read on. And beware of the curse words (if by chance they offend you) - there seem to be a lot of them in this chapter. I think it's Seifer's fault though. This was a hard chapter to write..._

Chapter Eight

The Force of Instinct

Sometimes people had ended up at the orphanage: families with young children, trying to find an uninhabited stretch of beachland; naive sailors who washed up after storms; young lovers looking for escape. They were all welcomed in the same fashion by Matron's graces. Anyone over the age of ten was brought into the house and offered tea and some of the morning's muffins; anyone under the age of ten was sent to the beach to play with the other children.

It was through this intermittent information stream that the orphanage children came upon the idea of _summer camp._ One little girl had just come home when Daddy's motor broke and landed them beside Edea's stone house. She told her audience in glowing terms about all the activities summer camp had to offer. And the orphanage children - not realizing that their own life was much like perpetual summer camp - latched onto the idea and held it long after the little girl left.

Zell pleaded. Seifer threatened. Squall sulked. Selphie bounced. Irvine batted his lashes. Quistis presented arguments. All six of them combined their forces (in a remarkable display of their future grown-up strengths) and eventually they won. Counselor Matron and Junior Counselor Ellone decided on activities (and for five seconds, Quistis - in her undying desire to _be_ Big Sis Elle - wanted to be a counselor) and summer camp began.

One day Matron had presented them with large pieces of white paper and thick crayons and told them to draw out their future. Giggling, the children spent all morning on the masterpieces. Later in the afternoon Ellone had them stand up and display what the fortune-telling crayons had wrought.

Zell had drawn himself riding some sort of futuristic spacecraft (that looked, surprisingly, like a t-board) and winning a big race. Squall had drawn himself, just bigger, with Elle. Selphie and Irvine's pictures were somewhat mangled. Selphie had drawn herself in a bright dress at a party, surrounded by butterflies and fireworks; Irvine had drawn himself as a cowboy with a bunch of flowers and a horse. The two of them had then tried to tape their pictures together so that they were holding hands and, in the process, had ripped both. Quistis had drawn herself as a teacher, holding books and standing by a desk. Seifer's picture had showed him with a giant sword, fighting off a big ugly dragon, in front of a house that he declared as the stone orphanage. Once Elle looked closely, she saw the little faces in the window: black hair, yellow hair, brown hair clearly labeling who was who.

It was this picture - crayon Seifer defending the orphanage family - that flitted across Quistis's memory now as she stared into Seifer Almasy's face, her nerves still burning.

And the fire exploded into rage, simmering along every conduit in her body. Hyne _dammit,_ this was Seifer. None of them had remembered, none at all, and he had betrayed Garden once - that had hurt. But this, the second time, it was personal. Before, he could have been bewitched by sorcery and by Edea and by the search for Ellone, who in her own way had bewitched all children. This time it was real, it was Seifer, and it cut _deep_.

"Oh, don't be so surprised," she hissed, backing away to a point where Hyperion couldn't reach her without a little bit of warning. "I should have known it would be you. You bastard."

To her surprise, the shock flickered once but didn't go away. And a slight trickle of unease registered, in that small detached part of her mind.

Seifer raised Hyperion across from her, and his trained eyes watched as her body shifted stance in response. "What the fuck are you doing here, Trepe?"

"I'm hunting down your ass. I'd ask what you're doing here, but it's no big secret."

The shock in his eyes flickered again into something Quistis recognized suddenly as confusion. Seifer bit down on the emotion, his eyes dimming into simple anger. "Get the fuck out of here."

She laughed, once, her wrist sending Save the Queen into an eloquent snap. "You seem surprised to see me."

His voice, sharp as a blade, was dripping with sarcasm. "I must confess, Trepe, you've finally shocked me. I was never expecting you. I should feel honored to be visited by Garden's missionaries, but frankly, I'm pissed off. So piss off."

"Nice try," she retorted. "Like I'll just leave and let you get back to your _work._"

She realized that Seifer had been backing down the hall and that she had followed him, the two of them moving instinctively to keep safe distance between their weapons. They were now circling each other in a starkly empty room with two blinding windows. Her eyes flicked to the floor momentarily, taking in details. A folding cot, against one wall. A duffle bag with wrinkled clothes. If Seifer did live here, he hadn't lived here long.

"Might I enquire," Seifer's cold voice asked over Hyperion's blade, "who is behind this search? Is Galbadia hunting for the Sorceress's lapdog again? Or has B-Garden decided to offer me amnesty again? It must be someone serious if they sent Quistis Trepe - I mean, they must be paying very well." His voice was mocking.

"Don't play stupid, Seifer," she said in a voice that might have been her instructor's voice had it not been tinged red.

"I can't think of any recent crimes that would have been _so_ serious that they caught Garden's attention," he said, and although his voice was still raw and angry, she recognized truth - surprisingly. Her fury dimmed momentarily as she watched, listening intently, wanting him to reveal more.

"Or did you hunt me down of your own accord?" he continued, seeing the flicker of thought in her eyes. "Decide to take matters into your own capable hands. Why Quistis, I never knew you cared." He batted his eyelashes at her.

"Shut up, Almasy," she snapped. "I didn't know it was you until I saw your ugly mug - although, granted, I should have guessed."

"Trepe, if I had any idea what the fuck you were talking about, I'd be a genius."

"You know _exactly_ what I'm talking about!"

Her anger and rage and sense of betrayal flared up like fireworks, and for a moment Quistis was so _angry_ that she actually saw red. The shadows on Seifer's face were edged with red, and Hyperion fairly gleamed with it. How dare he - Before she knew what she was doing, she had taken a step forward and spit in his face. Quistis Trepe, who had never spit at anything - who didn't know how to spit, who ironed her SeeD uniform every morning, who had been so concerned about her image that she wouldn't even use curse words.

She was just as surprised as Seifer, and for a moment their eyes locked in shock. She saw a lot in Seifer's eyes at that moment: fear, anger, relief, indignance, confusion. _Confusion?_ The fire along her spine dimmed slightly.

Seifer stepped back, holding Hyperion steady but not threateningly, ready for defense but not attack. "Trepe," he said, and his voice was strangely un-confident. "What the bloody hell is going on?"

"_Hyne,_ Seifer, stop playing dumb." Quistis shook her head slightly, as if to settle her thoughts. Her mind was whirring, gears turning, tearing the facts apart and putting them back together in different ways, trying to see what fit -

"You gave me detention for spitting once," Seifer said, his voice gaining back the Almasy confidence. "Quistis Trepe would _never_ do something so dirty. Who are you, and _what the bloody fuck is wrong_ _with you_?"

"What's wrong with me?" Her voice was high, red; and something broke inside of her, letting loose the torrent. "You're running an organization that's trying to take down Garden from the inside - you're targeting innocent people - some bullshit scientific organization roped you in with their brain-washing - and you want to know what's wrong with me?"

She took a breath and would have continued, but Seifer raised Hyperion threateningly. His face had darkened into a solid sort of anger, and Quistis remembered how fierce of a fighter he was.

"_What_?" His voice was a growl.

"Elsevier, Seifer, does the name ring a bell?" It was her turn to be sarcastic, and she relished it.

There was a strange moment of silence. Quistis decided to fill it. "We found you, Seifer. We put the pieces together. We _know_ Elsevier has been trying to destroy Garden from the inside, and we're prepared to take care of the people responsible -"

"It's not me, Trepe."

Her eyes snapped to his face. "What?"

"I shit you not, Trepe. You've got the wrong man."

Looking back, Quistis was amazed to see that she hadn't given a second's thought to the possibility that Seifer could be lying. Yes, she had questioned it as a dutiful SeeD might, but deep in her heart she believed him. Instinctively. Gut reaction. She knew all too well that Seifer Almasy never lied. He never told the truth, either: he _shouted_ the truth, shoved it into other people's faces, very often violently. _Let me tell you about my romantic dream._

As his Instructor, Quistis found that she had to be very careful in reprimanding Seifer. If he was guilty, he'd yell it out with much pride and no remorse. If innocent, he'd call out undeniable proof to that effect - which was, most often, worse than the crime she had been accusing him of. Every bone in her body believed the words as they came out of his mouth - Seifer was telling the truth.

She wondered briefly if this was dangerous. The Seifer she'd known was Pre-War Seifer, Pre-Sorceress Seifer. They'd all changed so much. She knew she'd changed: lightened up, learned to curse, broken her addiction to coffee (well, almost). Seifer could have changed as well; she had no way to know.

She shouldn't trust her instincts in this case.

Quistis flicked her eyes back to him, prepared to play the game. His game.

"Then what the hell are you doing here?"

"I live here, Trepe."

Her eyes flicked back to the bag on the floor, the barren walls. "Sure you do. You move a lot?"

"Actually, yes."

"And why is that?"

"Well, let's see. I did a lot of really bad shit a little while ago - not entirely my fault - and there are a lot of people in the world that hate me. And sometimes they follow me around and bother the shit out of me - either try to kill me, or try to get me to join some stupid-ass save the world atone-for-my-fucking-sins organization. And so to keep my sanity I move around a lot."

"Why here? Why Argun?"

"The scenic view."

"Har har." Quistis was not in the mood to be frustrated. "That doesn't help your case, Seifer."

"Look, Trepe," Seifer said, and there was a hard edge to his voice. "I came here to Esthar because they only _sorta_ want to kill me, as opposed to Galbadia, Deling, Balamb, Trabia, and everyone else, who _really_ wants to kill me. I ended up in Argun because it's as dirty and shitty as I am, so I blend in real nice. And I can't leave because the city sentries won't let me. Not like I want to, anyway, since I'm currently _alive_, and would like to stay that way. Will you leave me the fuck alone now?"

"Tell me this, Seifer. Why do all the clues point to you? A secretive man out to destroy Garden and protect the Sorceresses and keep his anonymity at all costs. They even got the grey coat right." Quistis dropped this one like a bomb. "Grey fucking coat, Seifer, living in the top floor of these apartments. Explain that?"

"I didn't know you knew how to swear, Trepe."

"Fuck you."

Seifer looked mock-thoughtful. "Apparently you only learnt one word, though."

Quistis chose to look around the room again, instead. She noticed that both she and Seifer had lowered their weapons, although neither had relaxed their stance much. Her mind was strangely blank. She wished it was furiously churning as usual, computing all the data and spitting out the answer. She needed an answer. A nice long equation, with thirty-two variables, all solved for simultaneously. Variables like What is Seifer really doing here?, Is he telling the truth?, and Where is the nearest pot of coffee?. She put a hand to her head briefly, as if to jump-start the question-solving machine. More blankness.

She looked back to Seifer, who was watching her.

"Don't just stand there," she snapped, her hold on her temper quickly failing. She didn't know what was going on - she _never_ lost her temper. She was a tall golden statue. She was made of ice. She was infallible, unbotherable. Damn. "How do you explain that every clue ties together very neatly in one pretty little package _and points to you_?"

Seifer shrugged his shoulders, casually letting the tip of Hyperion fall to the ground in what appeared to be a gesture of defeat (although Quistis wasn't fooled for a second). "Oh, I don't know, Trepe," he said, raggedly. "I'm an easy target, maybe?"

Quistis was shocked into silence.

"Look," he said, almost resigned. "I don't want to fucking fight with you, okay, but I will if you're going to do anything stupid. I'm not part of any scientific organization, although I've been asked to join about five. I can barely _spell_ 'science', Trepe. Chances are somebody is looking for a scapegoat and they found me. I'm everybody's scapegoat nowadays, Trepe. It's nothing new to me."

She was still silent, and Seifer broke out into an arrogant grin. "You never thought of it that way, did you, Trepe? Holy Hyne's Ass, you didn't, did you? I thought of something before the great Quistis Trepe did. I deserve a cigarette."

It's not possible, Quistis thought. The answer is so easy, so perfect. If it's Seifer, everything fits together.

If it's not Seifer, nobody will believe him anyway.

I shouldn't believe him. It's a threat to SeeD security if I take him at his word and he's lying.

_What happened to 'innocent until proven guilty'?_

_It was replaced by 'better safe than sorry'._

She'd never faced something like this before. The inner voices, the clockwork in her brain - there had always _been_ an answer.

"Wouldn't that make sense?" Seifer continued, deliberately musing. "I mean, there are probably a couple people that know I'm here. They could spread a rumour or something. I bet it was -"

"No," she said. Her heart and her brain were arguing, and she knew something was wrong, because she didn't have a heart. Especially for Seifer. But somehow it felt like - like someone had accused Irvine of rape, maybe. His reputation might lend itself to an explanation, but anyone who knew him knew him incapable of something like that.

And yet being a SeeD had taught her to think only with her mind. Emotions led to weakness. And she knew the choice she had to make. For Garden's sake.

"Seifer, I'm not going to believe you without proof. The evidence led to you, and you're a suspect until we can show otherwise. Will you come with me?"

She was offering him a chance to come quietly, to resolve this with only herself and maybe another authority. She'd thought of going to Shain - he'd understand, maybe. She couldn't go to Galbadia, and Balamb was flat out. But Trabia had suffered from Seifer as well. Maybe this wasn't a good idea. She'd thrown it out blindly, the chance to avoid the fight she knew was coming...

"Are you asking me out on a date, Trepe?" Seifer said, and by his voice she knew his answer. The mood between them had suddenly turned cold. Both of them raised their weapons instinctively. "Like hell I'm coming with you."

The clash came suddenly. Seifer spun his weight and made to attack her. Her GF-fueled senses let her slip nimbly out of his way, blocking with the staff of her whip. As she blocked she noticed that he was coming at her at an angle that wouldn't kill her, just knock her out. Not like being unconscious with Seifer would be pleasant. But it would probably be more pleasant than death.

She parried again as he struck again, a downward thrust that she knocked aside with the staff again. Luckily she'd had it upgraded, strengthened for a close-combat situation like this one. She took a step back, knowing that at long-range she would dominate. If Seifer had wanted to use the gun part of the gunblade, he would have done it by now.

He followed, watching her move. She made a snap towards him with the whip and he knocked it away, the tip just barely grazing his upper arm. Her mind was slowly starting to come back into motion, the ingrained habits of watching an opponent waking it from its gritty slumber. She was straining, actually. She'd learnt how to fight a gunblader, yes - but never how to fight one who wasn't trying to kill you. One would think this was a good thing, but it meant Quistis had no idea how to predict his movements and techniques. And her extensive knowledge of combat details and theory was one of her strengths - one she'd just lost.

A fight between a gunblade and a whip was a strange thing. One weapon designed almost exclusively for distance, dexterity, and precision; the other designed for a hands-on, more gruesome look at the enemy. Quistis and Seifer had skirmished before, in the practice ring at Garden. They both remembered it, too.

And now they were moving around each other in the same strange kind of dance they had back then, each testing the other. Quistis, the eternal teacher, wanting to draw techniques from her student like she drew magic; and Seifer, the bully, wanting everything he did to be the best anyone had ever seen.

Quistis's mind was picking up speed, accelerating quickly. She knew she should have re-junctioned for close combat, but she hadn't thought, hadn't had time.

Why wasn't he trying to kill her?

What, exactly, was he trying to do?

"Seifer," she began, "Look. I'm not making any decisions here in this room. All I want is to go somewhere where we can sort out these details with a mediator involved. I just -" a pause, as she dodged (barely) a particularly fierce slash. "-think it would be -"

The sentence trailed off as she leapt back again. He was approaching her, and she was backing down, the strange non-violence of the fight leaving her unwilling to press forward. If she'd had a second she could have re-arranged her junctions to compliment her opponent. The thought produced a quick surge of energy from Shiva, a cold angry strength tickling the back of her mind.

_Magic._ She knew Seifer used magic in his fights sometimes. It was how he had distracted Squall so long ago. Funny, he hadn't been trying to kill Squall either. She had no protection against an unexpected use of magic, she realized.

Then again, Seifer probably didn't have any either.

"I can get you out of the city," she offered, although she wasn't sure how. "And I won't take you to Balamb. We'll go somewhere-"

"No," he growled. "You're here. This is your call, Trepe, take some fucking responsibility. Either you believe me or you don't. This ends _here._"

She sighed, then, and took a step back, defeated. "I don't think I'm qualified to make that decision, Seifer," she said. Quietly. Resolutely. The tip of her whip came to rest gracefully on the floor.

Seifer looked at her, and for a second it was _real_ Seifer, eyes full of weariness. She saw he didn't want to fight any more than she did. They stood there and looked at each other - just looked.

And then the door swung open behind her.

It shouldn't have happened, Quistis thought later, but her mind was so scattered that she couldn't really excuse herself. She should have been prepared, but for once, she wasn't. She heard a voice - one that dragged familiarity up from the recesses of memory - bark out sharply, "QUISTIS?"

She felt the spell hit her in the back of the head the second she began to pivot, her arm bringing the whip up to snap between herself and her new opponent - but Save the Queen was no barrier to magic. Her well-trained muscles recognized the feel of the Sleep spell, and she knew she was out. Her arm, already weary, let the whip drop.

The momentum of her body carried her far enough that she could see Fujin's face, full of shock, and Raijin's arm still extended with the force of his quick casting. Her vision was getting spotty; she noticed deliriously that Fujin's hair was long, Raijin had lost some weight. Her knees had apparently already buckled and as she fell she made a mental note to congratulate Raijin on his efficient response someday. She heard the loud thud of Seifer's boots behind her as her head hit the floor and blackness descended.

* * *

_Am trying for a regular update schedule - I think maybe if I pick a day it will help me move my little ass along. How about once a week - every Sunday evening?_


	9. The Truths in the Mess

_Ooog. It was Memorial Day - forgive me for missing my first update! I went to visit my parents and (of course) it was crazy. I'm dropping this down to every two weeks, just in case, however. It'll make my life a little easier, and your chapters a little better..._

Chapter Nine

The Truths in the Mess

Surprisingly, Quistis rolled over and woke up.

Her muscles were full of the post-battle stiffness she had come to recognize, and as she moved they all seized up in protest against her. A little groan escaped her lips despite her best efforts. But she knew it wasn't the movement that had awoken her - although the motion had now destroyed any chance she had of being asleep - but the surprise at her own freedom of motion. Why would she be surprised?

Her brain felt pleasantly gooey, like a thick fog was just beginning to mist away. She recognized the groggy aftermath of a Sleep spell. Had she cast it on herself again? She remembered back in her cadet days, when she had studied frantically for finals, running only on adrenaline, determination, and Cura (which was all she could get her hands on). After the studying and the projects and all were over she forced herself to Sleep by magic. But she was in the middle of - something important. Why would she be casting Sleep?

She stretched, slowly, relishing the feeling of it, working the Sleep out of her muscles. There was nothing alarming about this. Falling asleep in battle gear was a normal, everyday occurrence for a working SeeD. What was so surprising?

Through the muddle of the lingering magic, a thought emerged, like a bubble popping to the surface: she had expected to be tied up.

Tied up? Quistis laughed; her lungs hurt. The Sleep spell often produced a happy, groggy aftermath, not unlike drugs (or so she'd heard). The smile deepened as she stretched again. Why would she have expected to be tied up?

Her hand brushed something a little strange - Save the Queen was secured at her waist. That was unexpected - she didn't normally take armed naps. She didn't normally take naps, true, but she especially didn't take them with her whip. Weapons weren't cuddly, and Save the Queen had thorns.

The door opened, and she heard someone walk in. Normally she would have frozen, stiffened, probably reached down for the Queen and given her visitor hell. However, her bones and nerves were all still laced with Sleep; she knew her reaction was unusual, just as she knew that the surprise upon waking was unusual; but at this point she didn't care. She rolled over lazily and gave the door a brilliant, winning smile.

Headmaster Shain was standing there, dressed in chinos and a blue turtleneck sweater. He leant against the doorjamb casually, returning her smile with what must have been his best.

Aha, Quistis thought. Handsome man, leaning against the door, smiling at me. I must still be dreaming. Her smile became even wider.

"You're finally awake," Shain said, to which she replied, "Am I?"

He shook his head at her, rolling his eyes, a genuine smile on his face. "You've been sleeping - magically-induced Sleep, that is - for quite a while."

Quistis continued to smile her silly smile, but her curiosity was piqued. Why was Shain here? She had certainly expected something else, which was even more curious, because she didn't remember why. She decided to tally the facts in her head - what had she thought she'd wake to?

Fact one: she'd been fighting (her muscles told her this much). Fact two: she'd been hit by neomagic (also proven by her sore body). Fact three: she'd expected to wake up a captive somewhere. These facts could be related, she mused. She'd been in a battle with someone, and had been hit with a Sleep spell, and had expected to wake up as someone's prisoner.

Which left her with fact four: she hadn't expected Shain. Was she Shain's prisoner? She noted the distinct lack of captive labels, such as rope or handcuffs. Shain didn't seem the type to handcuff her to the bed, she thought - and then realized how naughty that was, and giggled.

So she wasn't Shain's prisoner. Fact four and a half: she'd expected to be _someone else's_ prisoner. Who was it?

It had to be someone good to have hit her with a Sleep spell. Quistis prided herself on her awareness and preparation skill - she must have been caught completely off-guard to have been struck in battle at all.

"Quistis?"

Shain's voice brought her back to reality quickly; he was grinning at her. "You must be out of it. You've been staring at my sweater for the past five minutes."

"Thinking," Quistis replied, and was immediately embarrassed by the sound of her own voice. Dry and caked. She noticed for the first time that Shain was carrying a glass and a pitcher, and he gestured towards it. She nodded. He poured the glass full of what looked like chilled water and brought it to her, sitting down on the bed beside her. She drank long; it was cold and refreshing, and her head was pounding with the magic.

"You must be hurting, Quistis," he said conversationally. "You were hit with about half a dozen Sleep spells - whoever got you, they got you good."

"Half a dozen?" she blurted out. "Are you serious?"

"As serious as a Sensor can be," Shain replied gravely.

A Sensor was the nickname for any person especially sensitive to neomagic residue. Every class of SeeD turned out to have at least one or two. Sensors were empathetic and perceptive to any sort of neomagic activity. A trained Sensor could predict a spell's cast by the gathering of particles in the air. A well-trained Sensor could walk into a room after a battle and from the remaining residue, decipher exactly what had been cast - an expert could tell you where, when, and in what order. Trabia was expected to have at least a couple Sensors, but the fact that Shain had had one working on her was a little unreal.

For a while, Quistis had actually suspected Rinoa of being a Sensor - the girl's intuition towards magic was astounding, and the skill with which she had picked up the Draw and Cast abilities had been a tell-tale sign for a civilian. Quistis had wanted to ask her, and to test her for it, thinking that Rinoa would be pleased to have something to offer to the little group of SeeDs. But then the young girl had become a sorceress, and asking a sorceress about an affinity for magic was like testing a duck's affinity to water. Pointless.

But - if Shain had a Sensor Adept looking after her - that was yet another clue that something strange had happened.

"With that much magic in your system," Shain said slowly, shifting his weight on the bed beside her to refill the empty glass, "it'll probably take a little while before you remember who, exactly, cast six Sleep spells on you."

"Mmmph," Quistis said. It was supposed to be an intelligible response. She was thinking again, about six Sleep spells, and about being caught in the middle of a battle, and about Shain. Who had found her? Where had she been?

Her brain was beginning to clear up - the water was helping, much like a hangover - and so she thought backwards. She was in bed, surprised at her ability to move, and the door had opened. It had been Shain, and she had been surprised to see him, a kindly face. Who was it that she -

_"Seifer,"_ she gasped, and shot up in the bed, water from the half-empty glass splashing down over her battle gear, where it formed tiny droplets against the treated leather and rolled onto the blankets beneath her. Apartments - Grey - finding Seifer - battle - Fujin and Raijin - sleep spell -

"That was much quicker than I expected," Shain said, almost conversationally. "Do you have any idea how much magic residue you just shocked out of your system?"

"What do you know?" Her voice was urgent and demanding, a clear contrast from Shain's casual tone. "Where was I?"

"Quistis." Shain reached forward and grabbed her shoulders, stopping what would have been her attempt to climb out of the bed. "You need to calm down. Even though you can't feel it, there are still the remains of six Sleep spells riding around in your blood, and if you go rushing off right now you'll get sick. And you _know_ that." He carefully reached behind her to prop two pillows up behind her and forcefully leaned her back onto them. "I'll tell you anything you want to know, but you're going to have to stay here."

Everything _was_ rushing back, and it was making her nauseous. She remembered the fight with Almasy, weapon to weapon. She remembered the feeling as her brain shut down, overloaded with confusion. But that had been in Argun - how had she ended up here with Shain?

She looked around for the first time, and recognized the bland decor of the Trabian trailers. So I am back in Trabia, she thought. How did that one happen?

"How did I get back here?"

Shain smiled at her slightly. "What do you remember?"

"I'll tell you in a little bit," she said breathlessly, "but you need to tell me how the hell I got here, so that I can make it all fit."

Shain shifted on the bed, and she could feel the entire mattress shift as his weight moved. "Trabian SeeD stationed in Argun received a call from the police about a strange situation in a relatively shady hotel."

"You have SeeD stationed in Argun?"

Shain nodded, a small smile spreading. "It's known as grunt punishment. SeeDs who are close to cadet status but keep acting up or jerking off are sent out to help law enforcement in Argun or some other equally nasty place. It's like a little mission, meant to give more experience, but what it really does is whip the troublemakers into shape. We pawn it off as the community service from hell."

Like Seifer, Quistis said, but did not say. It was a good idea. "So they found me ...where?"

Shain snickered. "The call was involving an unconscious woman in an elevator. Apparently the Argun police force thought she could possibly be a threat. She was armed, see, and so even unconscious they were frightened of her weapon - it's pretty scary looking. So they hauled in the SeeD cadets. Once they looked up your fingerprints they contacted me, and I came to get you."

"So they found me in a -" Her brain caught up with her. "You came to get me?"

Shain looked her in the eye. "I wanted to make sure it was you, and make sure you were okay."

His words were laced with something, and Quistis found herself compelled to meet his eyes. He was staring at her with some concern, his bright eyes unusually dark, and it struck her as kind of odd. Why would a Headmaster she had only spoken with a handful of times travel across the ocean to pick up a SeeD too stupid to save her own ass from a Sleep barrage?

But the concern in his eyes looked genuine. Perhaps Shain was just a friend, with no other motivations. She would need her share of friends over the upcoming years. She smiled at him, and she saw his returning smile start deep in his eyes.

"So," she continued before it could become awkward (and it was certainly heading there). "They found me in an elevator, still armed, unharmed, just - sleeping?"

"Yeah. You were soused in Sleep magic, too. The first cadet who touched you apparently wasn't paying attention and he almost went under as well."

Quistis snorted. "He wasn't paying attention in class."

"We don't have instructors like you."

She rolled her eyes. "All your instructors are smart enough to avoid getting hit by spells that effectively stop combat, eh?"

"You're smart enough to avoid it," Shain said simply. "What stopped you?"

"Distraction," Quistis said desolately, reaching for the water glass again. She eyed it. "Please tell me this is vodka."

Shain burst out laughing. "You've had a glass and a half," he chuckled. "You tell me if it's vodka."

"You don't seem like the type to get me drunk," she said mock-sadly, and drained the glass again.

Shain rolled his eyes. "Don't tempt me, Quistis," he said, his voice light and joking.

"Hah." She held out the glass for a refill. Another effect of status-inducing magic was dehydration; she'd never been hit this bad with it, but then again, she'd never been hit this bad with status magic either.

"So what was it?" Shain set the empty pitcher on a nearby table and brought his legs up on the bed, crossing them beneath his body. "A nice pair of legs?"

She laughed, bringing her own legs up, tucking her knees under her chin. "I wish." She was strangely apprehensive about telling Shain about Seifer. She didn't want someone to rush off and make the reckless decision that Seifer was obviously and definitely guilty. She was still very confused about the entire situation. Doing something rash - like telling the wrong person - could have very severe consequences.

But Shain didn't seem like a rash person in the least. And he was a friend. And, above all else, he had come to rescue her, no matter how purposeful or not it was.

"You have to promise to let me finish the story before you react," she said tiredly. She could feel the molecules of water spreading through her dehydrated muscles, rushing into those areas that were particularly sore. She felt less nauseous, and less pain, but she also felt less awake. It was funny how a Sleep spell could make you tired. In small doses the spell could be a helpful tool, but in large doses - say, six at once - your body was too busy recovering from the high concentration of neomagic to get any _rest_.

Shain leant forward, elbows on his knees. "Is it that bad? I didn't think it was that serious - I mean, they let you get away."

She sighed, running her hands through gritty hair. "And you have to promise me a shower," she said absently.

"Would the lady like tea and crumpets while she's at it?"

She opened her mouth to curse at him, but then Seifer's _you only learned one swear word_ floated across her mind and she closed it abruptly. She was much more disturbed than she had thought.

"Okay, okay," Shain said quickly, taking her distress as a reaction to his comment. "I'll shut my mouth and let you talk. What were you doing in the hotel?"

"Chasing after Grey."

"And who is that?"

She chuckled, surprisingly. "Ok, sorry. I found the Elsevier headquarters. It had almost been destroyed, but there were some lights on, so I went inside. The entire place was actually running, inside all the wreckage - they'd hitched up nuclide lighting all down the halls, it was really sort of eerie. The secretary-receptionist guy brought me to a fat man who told me where I could find Grey."

Shain's eyes narrowed slightly. "And what did you have to do to get that?"

She picked at a thread on the blanket beneath her. "I promised to join their little society. I was posing as a Garden student, and they snatched me right up. It was almost unnerving." She looked up, meeting his eyes, seeing them full of the same concern she felt. "They're after Garden, Shain, I know they are. If someone was after SeeD for their skills, they'd just hire us."

"Backdoor recruiting," Shain said absently, and Quistis said, "What?"

He focused his gaze back on her. "Backdoor recruiting. You see it a lot in organizations like Garden, but also in other institutions, like the guilds and the universities. If one university can get a list of the people who are applying to another university, they go after them. It's already a target audience - people who are applying for university. They just have to convince the people on the list that they are offering a better deal. It happens all the time."

"But they're going after _graduates," _Quistis said. "Or cadets who have been through extensive training. Why would they go after people who were almost done?"

"What do you mean?" Shain uncrossed his legs and stretched them. "Why not?"

"Well," Quistis said slowly, stopping to pick her words carefully. "A SeeD who is almost finished has more to lose - they've invested a lot of time, money, and effort. It's like - like going to university and dropping out three credits before your degree. It's a waste."

"Ah," Shain replied. "You're looking at it from the logical standpoint."

"That's what I do," Quistis murmured.

"This logic deals on emotion," he continued, "which is much less predictable to someone like you. The farther you go in SeeD, the more likely you are to become disgruntled, to get screwed over by someone or something, to get pissed off. A fresh cadet is more willing to 'give it a chance'. A severely jaded cadet - this is a dangerous thing."

"And why am I unable to predict emotion?" she asked, intrigued.

"You don't seem like the emotional type," Shain said, quite serious. "You're too _practical_."

"I see," she said. And then, joking: "I guess I can't argue with it, then. Although I'd say that they were going after the demographic with the most training but not yet on the legal records."

"Touche," Shain said under his breath. "Your wisdom astounds me."

"Bugger off," Quistis said. "That's how I would look at the situation."

"Anyway," Shain said, laughing. "So you signed up to join this organization."

She had to smile. "Yes, and I found out a lot about it as well - I have some papers in my bag." Her heart plummeted. "My bag - my things - they're still in the hotel room."

"Who do you think I am?" He winked. "They're in my office."

"Thank Hyne," she said, breathless. "I need those papers."

"We'll go over those later," Shain said. "As for now, let's reconstruct the timeline. You were talking with a fat man."

Quistis laughed. "Yes, actually, I was. And he told me how to find Grey."

"Who - or what - is Grey?"

"Oh. Grey is their leader. There's something weird about him though." Aside from the fact that he might be Seifer - _no_. "They all say he wears a long grey coat, and that's where he got his name from, so I guess no one knows his real name. And apparently not very many people ever meet him - his directions get passed down."

"From where?"

"Who knows," she said, musing. Maybe Shain could help her figure this out before she dropped the bomb. She was beginning to get edgy, and the nausea was returning. "What do you think?"

"Sounds fishy," he began, and then stopped. "But you need to finish it first."

Damn.

"Well, the fat guy's directions pointed me towards some apartments."

"Aha, the apartments come into play."

"And he said that Grey hangs out on the upper floors with a few men."

"Cue the elevator."

Quistis could tell that Shain was trying to keep the mood light, and she appreciated it more than ever. "So I went looking for him."

There was a long, long pause. Quistis didn't want to say it, and finally, Shain had to ask; he reached out to just lightly brush the back of her hand with warm fingers and said: "Quistis. What happened?"

She took a deep breath. "I found Seifer Almasy."

In the silence that followed, she flipped her hand over and grabbed him by the wrist, holding onto him as if she were afraid he would have a seizure, or run out of the room and order an execution. Maybe she was - she didn't know what he was going to do. What she wasn't expecting was for Shain to twist his hand around so that he was holding hers - no, gripping it. Holding hands was for lovers, for entwined fingers and whispers. This was a gesture of both anger and grief.

He was staring at the floor so hard that she expected it to burst into flames. "Shain," she said hurriedly.

He looked at her, and she could tell he was trying to compose his face: although it was blank, his hand was still exerting pressure on hers. "Hyne." It was a breath. "What I'm trying to understand," he said softly, "is why you didn't barge in here and yell 'It's Seifer! Seifer did it!' or even 'I found Seifer, help me bring him in.' You woke up and didn't say a word about him. This makes me think," and his voice tightened a little bit, and he had to pause.

When he spoke again, his voice was very neutral, as if he was trying very hard to be very fair. "This makes me think that you have some reason to believe that Seifer isn't behind this. Or you have some reason to protect him." He swallowed.

"Please explain, Quistis."

His voice was still neutral and empty and void but Quistis could see into it, into the grief and bitterness that was Trabia's remains. She felt it too, but hers was clouded by the past and by confusion.

She must have remained silent for too long, for Shain continued: "I promised you that I would let you finish, and I see why now. But please, Quistis - finish. What else is there?"

"Gods," she said, and released his hand, burying her face in her palms. "Everything is completely wrong," she said suddenly.

"You're telling me."

Quistis didn't want to let out all of the confusion and the frustration she was feeling - she didn't want Shain to know how much of an internal wreck she was at this moment, and his anguish wasn't helping her at all. She tried to swallow it down, but it sat in her stomach like bile.

Breathe, she thought. Breathe first. Story second.

"I got to the top floor," she said in a very even voice. "I got out of the elevator and heard someone there. I spun to attack and crossed - crossed weapons with Almasy. It seemed to fit - grey coat, secretive, anti-Garden."

"It is convenient," Shain said, and his voice was almost a growl. He was running his hands through his hair nervously now that they were free.

"A little too convenient," Quistis said carefully. "I accused Almasy of this and he denied everything - said that the sorceress's toy made a very easy scapegoat."

"You say this as if you believe him," Shain said, his voice cool.

"I - I am not quite sure what to believe," Quistis said carefully. "I believe I might be prejudiced. Seifer used to be my - student at Garden, and I remember very clearly that he never ever lied to me about anything; in fact, the more controversial the fact was, the more proud he was to tell the truth." She swallowed, and then said lightly: "This line of thinking was, in fact, so distracting that Seifer's companions were able to come up behind me and hit me with Sleep before I noticed."

"Ah." Shain's throat contracted once as he, too, swallowed. "That explains the Sleep spells. There were two casters, though."

Quistis was momentarily distracted - that was quite a Sensor Trabia had at its disposal. "They were two friends of Seifer's, from B-Garden. I was their teacher as well. I recognized them."

Shain let out a long, ragged breath that sounded every bit as haggard as Quistis felt. He was sitting on the edge of the bed now, head cradled in his hands. He looks disturbed, she thought, and then laughed at herself. Of course he's disturbed. This is the man who was responsible for the bombing of his Garden.

"Shain, I..." She wasn't sure what to say - wasn't sure even of what she wanted to say. "I need your help on this. I am unable to make an objective decision because of my past with Almasy. I need guidance."

"Hyne, Quistis, you sound like a textbook," he said, his voice full of emotion where hers was carefully and exquisitely blank. "I'm 'unable to make an objective decision' as well. Look, Quis, he ruined everything that was precious to me. Do you think that I'm the one who should make the decision? Do you think I can help you?"

He didn't even sound mad - he just sounded upset. "I think you might really be the only one who _is_ capable of making this decision, Quistis. If you have a past with him that enables you to think of him as something other than a monster - if you knew him before, and he was something different - then you might be the only person able to actually think about this one."

"That's not all," Quistis whispered.

Shain looked up, his bright blue eyes full of concern and anguish and pain. "I don't need any more," he said, but she had already opened her mouth, offering him another piece of herself to try to make up for the pain.

"We grew up together," she began, the words filling her throat before she could even think them. "All of us did, me and Squall and Selphie and Irvine and Zell and - and Seifer. The memories came back partially while we were off, fighting. We were all in the same orphanage. That's why we were all - drawn together."

He was looking at her, she could tell, although her eyes were now fixed on her fingers, curled against her legs. "That's why I can't just condemn him - because he was my childhood friend, one that I don't really remember except in bits and pieces. That's why I can't be the one to make the decision ...and that's why I'm in danger if I..." She didn't want to say it, she really didn't want to say it...

"That's why I am in danger if I continue this mission. I am unable to make decisions and..." Her voice trailed off into anguish - frustration at her own inability to think, to control the situation.

"Gods." Shain looked at her and smiled, raggedly. "Why can life never be easy?"

She had to laugh, the horrible situation overwhelming her. Shain fell backwards on the bed, landing across her ankles. She wasn't sure whether to fidget them out or to leave them perfectly still, but he started talking, and she started listening.

"Headmaster Abrya died in the attack," he began, his eyes fixed on the ceiling, one hand resting on his forehead in Squall's gesture. "Abrya was my aunt, Quistis. I've never told anyone that. She was the reason I joined Garden, the reason I was lined up for Headmaster's training. She was like my own mother - and she died. Not in the bombing - she walked around for a few days before she collapsed. Internal bleeding."

Why was he telling her this?

"I'm telling you this," he continued, answering the unspoken question, "so that you can understand how hard of a damn time I am having trying to even think of the remote possibility that Seifer Almasy might be anything slightly less than three hundred percent evil."

"Shain," she began, but he cut her off. "I know, it's not fair of me, but fairness is not a necessity to keep breathing."

"Isn't it necessary for a Headmaster?"

"Quite the opposite," he said, throwing her a glance. As a Headmaster you will be required to _use_ your experience, not ignore it. That's what we gather experience for."

"But experience can color an answer."

"Black-and-white answers don't exist, Quistis. Or if they do, I haven't seen any. Sometimes the experience - the 'color' - is the only way you can possibly answer a question at all."

She opened her mouth, but he cut her off yet again. "Cid chose you as a candidate because he felt you had the sort of experience that would help you make decisions as a Headmaster. Keep that in mind."

Her mouth was still open, so she said sulkily, "At least you see why I was so distracted."

He laughed then, his upper body shaking her calves. "Yes. I'm not sure I forgive you yet, but I do see why."

Quistis played with a strand of hair that had fallen into her face. "I don't know what to do, Shain."

"I don't know what to tell you either." Shain closed his eyes, his weight warm against her legs, even if it was uncomfortable. "Talk to me, Quistis," he said finally. "Tell me what's going on in your head - explain what you're feeling, and I'll see if I can help you at all."

_Gods._ She wasn't good at feelings at all - she couldn't explain her feelings. They weren't facts, and she dealt in fact. _Reasons produce results._ Her own words to Zell echoed in her mind. Okay, so what were the reasons, first of all?

"The part of me that is a SeeD," she began, not really knowing where the words came from, "knows that I need to go back there and detain him - detain Almasy, even if I don't bring him in for trial. There are things that need to be answered, not just for me but for everybody else."

She gripped a bit of the blanket in her hand, trying to take out her frustration on it. "And another part of me knows - _knows_, Shain, not _thinks,_ not _feels_: _knows_ that Seifer is telling the truth. It feels too easy - too much like everything fell into place like it 'should', and the truth is missing somewhere. It feels - it feels right."

"But Quistis," Shain responded, "you just admitted that you have a past with - with Almasy."

"And you just told me that the past was a good thing," she retorted.

"Wait." Shain rubbed his temples roughly. "I think there's something to be said for experience, yes, but what you just described to me - it sounds like..."

He stopped, and Quistis sat up sharply. "Sounds like what?" Her voice was suddenly angry. "It sounds like you're accusing me."

He wouldn't open his eyes. "It sounds like there are feelings getting in the way, Quistis," he said softly.

She was shocked for a brief second, and then she started laughing, the hysterical laughter of someone who was under a great deal of stress. "Feelings?" she asked a little wildly. "Are you joking with me?"

"'It feels right'?" Shain quoted her. "Quistis, that sounds fishy."

"You wanted to know what I was thinking," she snapped, already regretting her decision to open her thoughts to the Headmaster. "I never said it makes sense. But - but Almasy and - and me? Right."

"You're sure."

"It's not those kinds of feelings," she said slowly, trying to explain to both Shain and herself. "It's not related to how I feel about Seifer at all. Part of my heart hates him, but my mind knows that the feelings of the heart don't always count. It's a feeling of rightness, whether I like Seifer or I hate him. It's - it's just what feels like truth," she said lamely.

Shain sat up (she twitched her legs in appreciation) and stared at the wall for a bit, not speaking. Then he leant over to her and, to her utter shock and surprise, gently took her face between his hands, turning her eyes to look into his.

"Are you sure?" His blue gaze searched hers.

She blinked, once, twice. "Not entirely," she said hesitantly, "but I'm more sure of it then I am of anything else."

Shain continued to look at her, and she met his gaze evenly. This was Shain's idea of a test, she supposed, and part of her rose in challenge to the heat of his eyes. In the midst of the confusion, she had finally made sense of one thing, and she was going to hold onto it - bright blue eyes be damned.

There were reasons out there, she knew. The world was driven by reason: reason and rules. Cause and effect. Underlying each and every action lies the force which drives it. And each action has an equal and opposite reaction.

"I need to find out," she said slowly, the words presenting themselves to her slowly but clearly. The mist of the Sleep spells was waning, and she felt tired again, but more herself than she had since she had seen Seifer's face. "And to find out I will need your help."

She reached up to grasp Shain's hands - her friend, her ally - and removed them from her face, lowering them to the bed and placing them there. "I need to go back and find him again."

Shain shook his head. "Bullshit," he said angrily. "I'll send a squad, we'll bring him back here. I'll even promise to keep quiet about it. But you're not going back."

"Bullshit," she echoed him. "This is my mission and I'll be the one to do what needs to be done."

"Bullshit," he said again. "You're a target now - both from Elsevier and Almasy himself. It's too dangerous for you."

"How dare you?" She rose from the bed, her eyes steel and shining. "You are _not_ in charge of me. Either help me, or I go alone."

Shain blinked at her, surprised, and then looked away toward the wall. His eyes remained there, unblinking, staring into shadows that were only in his mind. Finally he turned back to her and said softly:

"What will you need?"

She reached out and touched his hand again, once, softly. "Thank you," she said.

_So anyway - sorry for the delay, but I plead holiday. _

_Here's to everyone who has been with me since ch7-ch8..._

_Nynaeve77 (-Quistis never likes to admit she's wrong, or at least that's my guess. She's also always so prepared for everything. I like making her struggle. I do have more in store for 'poor' Seifer too...)_

_Noacat (-WOW, I love getting your reviews ...you always make me smile! Glad you're still with me, I really do look for you! Are you writing more of your story yet??)_

_Shortey (-I will make no comments on the romance. But I'm a bit of a softy, keep that in mind.)_

_San (-I got a lot of comments about people 'knowing', but I hope I've thrown a little wrench in the 'knowing' at this point...)_

_Raine (- Thanks! I try to make not only my ideas, but my style, as unique as I can and still be good...)_

_Chococat2 (-guess you're right about two weeks ... I used to be able to write a chapter every two days! College was easy, I guess.)_

_Knight Without a Cause (-Thanks! I'm glad you like it ... )_

_Dark Phoenix (Thanks - Here's another one, with less of a cliffhanger...)_

_Gilly Bean (I'm trying to commit, at least, so try to hold me to the two-week-Sunday thing? Heh.)_


	10. The Tricks of the Trade

Chapter Ten

_The Tricks of the Trade_

Quistis woke up the next morning feeling both embarrassed and sore.

The soreness was, of course, inevitable - residual magic always liked to make its presence known, even as it was fading. Her muscles were still taught with battle-stress and Sleep spells. Even her morning calisthenics didn't help as much - she fell backwards onto the bed with a brief groan.

She felt the embarrassment was inevitable as well. She had been out of line with Shain the night before. And as much as she would like to blame it on Seifer, it had been _her_ mistake. She had just let her mouth run, something Quistis Trepe was not known for. Unless she was quoting statistics from _Coulter's Handbook._

Shain - _Shain_ of all people! She could have called Squall ...well, okay, not Squall. But Selphie, Irvine, even Zell; any of them would have been willing to listen and advise her. Even Rinoa would have been helpful for once ... but no, she had to open her big mouth to someone she hadn't known more than a week or so (a week? Just how long had she been on mission?). As if she had no better outlets for her confusion and rage...

She felt her thoughts slam on the brake pedals and backtrack through themselves, and she was momentarily pleased. At least the recovery period had allowed the small, untouchable, calculating part of her brain to start working again. She took pride in that, since she couldn't take pride in much of her behaviour since she had rounded the corner at the top of the apartment complex.

Her mind presented her with Rinoa.

Great, Quistis thought. My brain's finally working, but it's not working _correctly._

She really didn't have any problems with Rinoa. It was just hard for her to see what the girl had that was so special, that drew everyone to her. Quistis had spent her life as a model of restraint, tact, and proper behaviour (at least, until the past twenty-four hours). It wasn't just her personality - it was her _goal_. Her way of life. Rinoa's outbursts of thought and emotion simply struck her as silly.

Yes, Selphie Tilmitt was also a very silly girl, but she was also a very silly trained mercenary with a penchant for explosives and - at the end of it all - the ability to get _anything_ done that she wanted badly enough. Rinoa just looked to Quistis like a very silly girl. Who was known as much for whining as she was for silly useless plans.

But her mind insisted on bringing up Rinoa. She backtracked further. She'd been worrying about her outbursts, about having someone to talk to.

Someone to talk to about Seifer. Aha.

It made sense. Rinoa was probably the only other person in the world who could think about Seifer Almasy without adding the phrase "Death To" in front of his name.

Quistis bit her lip in thought. She didn't want to call Balamb, because Squall would get his belts in a bunch, and the last thing she wanted was for Squall to think that she couldn't handle herself. But maybe the next time she was there, or the next time she phoned in a report, she'd ask if Rinoa was there real quick. It would be a little strange for her to be asking for Rinoa, but maybe the young girl would have some advice on her former-boyfriend. And whether he could really be the head of an organization trying to take Garden down from the inside.

Seifer hadn't had any problems trying to feed Rinoa to Adel though.

She shook her head and stretched, feeling her muscles wince. Every part of her body and her mind just felt befuddled, and she wished that it was merely the result of half-a-dozen Sleeps. Right. She was tired of thinking and muddling and befuddling. She sat up in the bed, wrapping the sheets and the blanket around herself. Leaning precariously out of bed, she reached for the case to her laptop. She removed her notebook from the front compartment and selected a mechanical pencil from her stash.

She carefully tore out a piece of paper; resting the notebook in her lap, upside-down, she neatly creased the paper once down the middle, then unfolded it and centered it on the notebook. Brainstorming time. She found sometimes that she thought more clearly when writing, taking notes; something her eyes could help to piece together along with her brain.

Carefully, she wrote the word _Evidence_ across the top of the paper. On the left side of the fold, she wrote _"Seifer did it."_ On the right side: _"Seifer didn't do it."_

After staring at it for a while, she put quotation marks around the title. _"Evidence."_ She didn't have anything totally concrete anyway. Not yet.

She started making neat, careful notes underneath_ Seifer did it_, writing slowly, so as not to let anything slip past her. _1) Hints to grey coat (obvious clue). 2) Was right where Dulle (Elsevier) said he would be._

She went to write _3) Hates Garden,_ but then she started thinking about it. Did Seifer really hate Garden? He had spent his time there and, although he had shown a very distinct and proud lack of respect for authority, he had never shown any signs of hatred.

Well, until he had tried to kill all of them to protect his Sorceress.

Okay. Whether it was hatred or not, Seifer still had knowledge of Garden's workings and procedures. And there was someone in Elsevier - someone important, someone who was directing these strikes - that had some knowledge of Garden protocol.

Quistis thought some more, and then crossed out _Hates Garden._ In its place she wrote: _Apparent grudge against Garden. In-depth knowledge of Garden - could be source of subterfuge information._

Linked with that thought, she wrote _3b) Has shown no real loyalty to Garden in the past either._

The thoughts of the Sorceress conflict prompted her to write _4) Shows an affinity for Sorceresses - would fit in a pro-Sorceress organization._ This was at least what Elsevier saw in him, or what he saw in Elsevier, however it went. Another way they could be linked. At this point she was glad she had added the disclaiming quotes to _"Evidence"_. None of this was really evidence. The things she was writing were the kinds of things that some nameless authority would use to argue at her about Seifer's guilt.

In her head, actually, she was arguing with Squall about him. Squall was saying things like _5) No sign of him after the War until mentioned by Elsevier_ and _6) Seifer is a dumbass anyway_ (well, no, 6 was actually more like Zell). She wasn't really sure why she was defending him to Squall - and Zell - anyway. In her head. Lying in a bed in Trabia.

In a desperate attempt to be fair, Quistis tore her eyes away and planted them on the empty right half of the page.

_Seifer didn't do it._

Underneath she wrote: _1) Seifer denies knowledge of any contact with Elsevier._ But that was a weak argument to begin with. Beneath that she added _1a) Seifer doesn't lie._ Her mind added _as far as I know._

She crossed out #1 entirely and wrote almost sternly: _Gut feeling._

This list was almost useless. Next step, Quistis.

She wanted answers. And to get answers, she needed information. And to get information, she had to go back to Argun. Back to Elsevier. But how would she find out whether or not Grey was Seifer, or Seifer was Grey, or whatever? There were other facts she needed as well, but this new question had taken precedence.

But who would give her this information? She needed someone who ranked above Fat Man in both importance and intelligence. She wasn't sure how to get that. This wasn't like a restaurant, where you could ask for the manager. It would certainly send up some red flags.

And her current persona - Stupid SeeD Girl - 'Athaena' - if she gave away that she _wasn't_ planning on joining Elsevier, she'd lose her only path into the organization. She'd gained the trust of at least one Fat Man - could she afford to blow it now, on guesswork? Why would Athaena be asking for information about Seifer? It wouldn't go over well - wouldn't be believable at all. How would she even guess that Seifer was involved?

Surprisingly, she felt her brain put on the brakes, again. Path into the organization. If only Athaena had some reason to ask about Seifer -

_Hyne_, Quistis, how stupid can you be?

If Athaena had, perhaps, looked a little into the clues and figured it out - or if, by Shiva, she had gone to the apartments and recognized Seifer Almasy - wouldn't she have a right to be upset? What Trabian SeeD would want to join an organization led by the man who had bombed their Garden?

Exalted at her own clever-ness, Quistis looked down at her list. Soon she could have answers to all of these questions. It was dangerous, yes - but she'd set herself up neatly to ask the exact questions she needed without raising too much hell.

She picked up the piece of paper and held it out before her, the Float spell running down her arm and out through her fingers. She removed her hand. The single piece of paper remained in midair, turning gently to the currents of magic within her room. She watched it for a second, and then reached out to touch it once again. The simple Fire current coursed through her fingertips and leapt into the paper. Her list of _"Evidence"_ burnt in mid-air.

She watched, suddenly sobered, until the floating fire had consumed the entire list. Ashes, one by one, fell to the floor with soft noise as the Float dissipated. The scene was a darker image of the white snow which carefully fell outside her window. Magic - the world's life, the world's bane. Quistis sighed.

She pulled her things together one by one, re-packing her smaller bag. No - she didn't really want to leave her things at Trabia and come back for them - but it would be much easier that way. She would just have to ask Shain if she could leave them here - again.

With that thought in mind, she went to find the Headmaster to get herself a transport ticket back to Argun. She stalked down the hallway, her day-bag shouldered, dragging the larger wheeled case behind her, her steps the model of determination. No more indecisiveness. She'd had a mentor once, at a research job, that had told her as a piece of guidance that "It is better to ask forgiveness than permission. This may sound strange, but no one will ever fault you for trying and failing. They will only fault you for not trying in the first place. It is not doing wrong that is the crime - in fact, there is no wrong. There is only doing and not doing."

At the time, Quistis hadn't been sure whether the advice was meant or was a warning to her as to not be a lazy bum. But she'd taken the words to heart in her young adult life. The Trepe addendum to the advice was: "And while you're doing, you may as well do it perfectly."

She gave Shain's door three quick raps and - on his response - opened it to the scent of coffee and the soft sound of keystrokes. "Help yourself," Shain said, not even looking over his shoulder, "I know you want to."

"Gracious," Quistis said, and went straight for the pot.

At the sound of her bags hitting the floor, however, Shain threw a glance over his shoulder. "Packed already?" he asked.

She nodded, and swallowed. "Will you book me another transport and ticket back to Argun, Headmaster?"

Shain opened his mouth to argue, but he was slightly put off by the formal _Headmaster_ and Quistis used it to her advantage. "Formal request, sir. The persona I've created will be expected to return, and I plan to use the opportunity to obtain more valuable information."

His eyebrows knit, his entire facial expression saying _Quistis, why are you talking like a textbook?_ But she knew it was the only way to carefully replace the space between them. The space that had been lost. She didn't want distance - she liked him - she just wanted a nice, honest, _proper_ space -

_That's not proper, Quistis_ -

She shook her head and blinked. Shain's forehead was lined with his confusion and concern. For a brief second she wanted to crack some joke about that devil's city just to see him grin.

But they had shared too much, she and he, too openly and rashly (and easily). And she knew that whenever she tried to open up - or actually did open up - the door came back to slam in her face. This was a safety maneuver on her part.

She saw Shain looking at her. She watched in his eyes as he realized what was going on, and as he agreed to play the game. She watched him look at her, make sure that she was watching as he agreed. "I'll make your arrangements, Quistis. The tickets will be waiting for you at the station. Have Cassie call for a transport for you."

"Thank you, sir." A pause - she couldn't let it go _so_ formally. "Can you keep my bag for me?"

Shain looked up at the instant change in tone. "Of course," he said quickly. "I'll just keep it in the closet in here."

"Won't that take up space?"

Shain smiled at her, an echo of his grin. "The closet's mostly empty."

Smiling in return, Quistis picked up her day-bag and headed out. Cassie cheerfully arranged for her transport to the train station, where she picked up the line into Esthar (tickets with her name on it, just as Shain had promised). She looked through the schedule: in Esthar proper she caught the transfer line out to Argun. With the packet was a pre-paid ticket coupon - to use for her trip home, she assumed. _At least it wasn't already marked for Trabia._ Although she'd have to go back to pick up her bag.

On the train, she took a good ten minutes trying to decide what to wear. SeeD uniform? Battle gear? She'd been wearing her tan outfit the last time; but she was afraid that the SeeD uniform was a bit too much. She opened her day-bag, looking inside, her glance going from embroidered jacket to reinforced leather ...

In the end, she just kept on what she was wearing - blue jeans, rolled slightly at the cuffs to stay out of the way of her dark boots, with a simple dark tank top and a sweatshirt (now, with Trabia's cold at her back, tied around her waist). Let them think Athaena had come running. The important part was that she didn't look like herself. Quistis Trepe hated civilian clothing and made it well known that no event was too informal for a SeeD uniform. The civvies would help her persona. She napped, and stared out the window, and napped again until the transfer line.

She stopped at the same hotel she had before (there were no bugs, she thought, and then amended - no _large_ bugs) and only took a few seconds to drop off the bag. She had decided to leave Save the Queen in her bag - the massive whip, hanging off of her belt, would be a little obvious. But she did take the time to junction. Shiva thrilled at the personal attention - the ice goddess had always been a tiny bit haughty, which may have been why Quistis had clicked with her so well initially (although she never would have admitted it). Siren was more aloof, just a song in the back of her mind, an extra pair of eyes roaming, a wandering bardess looking for jewels. And shy but blustering Pandemona came out of hiding as Quistis and Shiva coaxed her out, lending her strength to Quistis' efforts.

Quistis always reveled at speaking with her GF allies. They sent her images that were not images, instinct and emotion that was not hers but yet was trusted implicitly. For Quistis's well-ordered mind these random impulses were conceptually hard to grasp - and yet Quistis had no problem accepting any help her GFs gave her. She'd learnt to involve the forces in her mind in her own Junctioning processes - sometimes the ancient ladies had better ideas than she did.

As for now, she thought about tactics. She wanted a balance between the raw force you needed in a one-on-one battle and the broader cunning and strength required when facing a group. She felt Shiva read through her thoughts and converse with the other two in a mystical barrage faster than lightning. Then, all three together, the GFs began piecing together what they considered to be her best defense. Shiva took command - she'd always been bossy and loved being in charge (another reason her compatibility with Quistis was so high). Pandemona offered here and there as Shiva asked, while vague Siren simply went along with the flow.

The attention gave Quistis the chills. It was thrilling and ethereal to feel the magical energies wash over her body. But then again, it only reminded her of the current dependence of SeeD on the strengths lent by the Guardian Forces. And the constant Junction - ReJunction that Shiva experimented with usually left her nauseous.

Once they were done, Quistis stood up gradually, trying to see how they had arranged their assistance. Since she was going without her whip, they had added more to her awareness and speed than raw strength - she'd be fighting on the fly, or with some weapon she found there. Her magic strength was also boosted through the roof, and she felt her most powerful spells readily available, literally beneath her fingertips. Again, they'd done a flawless job.

And as such, she took off for Elsevier.

Coming out of the hotel, she arranged it so that it looked like she was coming from the train station, and then took off in a brisk jog. She picked up the pace as she took the first turn, and then turned it into a full-out sprint as the building came into view. She _wanted_ to be noticed - she was sure that there was some kind of security, and she wanted them to know she was coming.

Throwing herself in the doorway, she allowed herself to take a slight minute to catch her breath, and then looked up at the receptionist, her eyes burning. He looked alarmed and nervous over the small handgun that he was currently pointing at her. Shiva rose up in anger to let her know that she was safe; she let the rage in her eyes grow.

"I want to talk to Dulle, and I want to do it now," she said, angrily. "No - forget him. Who is his boss? I want to talk to his boss."

"I'm sorry, miss," the man said, in a voice that was surprisingly calm compared to the doubt in his eyes. "You can't just barge in here, now, and -"

"Don't tell me what to do," she growled. "I'm from Garden, alright, I was here the other day. And I need to talk to someone. Someone important. Now."

He shifted his grip on the handgun as if to remind her that it was hanging in mid-air between them; he seemed slightly scared that the presence of the gun had not been enough to give him the upper hand. "I'm sorry, I can't do that."

"Let me in!" Quistis shrieked, hoping that throwing a tantrum would get the guard to let her past. "I have to get in, I have to..."

"Is there a problem?"

A cold voice from the hallway made her look up in absolute shock. Even better - her noise had attracted the attention of someone who at least looked important. She composed her face back into fire and steel and said, "Who are you?"

"Nordic, put away the gun." The receptionist looked slightly pissed, but then lowered the weapon. "I might ask who you are, young lady."

She managed to flush. "My name's Athaena," she said gruffly. "I was here the other day - I spoke with someone called Dulle?"

"Ah, yes. The Trabian cadet. Is there some sort of problem? "

She eyed the man up and down, taking him in for the first time. His hair was light, as were his eyes - some pale grey color that hinted at northern heritage - Trabia, perhaps? Quistis found that she didn't like his stance; he was too confident, looking at her in amusement instead of the receptionist's fear. It made her nervous herself.

"Sir, perhaps you'll know who I should go to," she said angrily. "Could I talk to you for a moment?"

His eyes flashed with humour and he nodded, gesturing down the hall. "Sure thing. Come with me." She took a step -

The noise and the light made her think that something had exploded, that the hall had been rigged; she felt Shiva rushing all her magical assistance into keeping Quistis alive. The noise was deafening. She threw herself backwards, her heart pounding -

And realized that it was just an alarm. She was now panting heavily, for real.

Beside her, the cold man laughed silently, and she decided that she definitely did hate him. "What the hell was that?"

"I thought as much," he said. "You'll have to remove your GFs before you enter."

"What?" The question slipped out before she could think, before she had even wondered how she could deny her junctioning.

He smiled at her. "See, many of our experiments are - sensitive to magic," he said, with an ugly pause. "The aura of the Guardian Forces which Garden favors can - upset our experiments." With an even uglier pause. "Please remove them."

Shit, Quistis thought. Without any junctions I'm sitting pretty, just waiting for them to close in. But if I don't risk it, I'll never get in...

Reluctantly, she reached into her mind. _Pandemona: Detach._ The quiet GF obliged and Quistis felt her muscles droop, their strength suffering slightly. She felt Pandemona's consciousness slide deep into the crevices of her mind.

Shiva's sense then flared up indignantly, and Quistis could almost hear her angry voice. The GF was upset, both at abandoning her host and at the thought that she might miss some action. Quistis knew she would be very angry when she was rejunctioned. Nevertheless, she bit her lip and severed the connection. _Shiva: Detach._ This time the separation of Shiva's support from her limbs and senses was more severe - partially because her bond with the ice goddess was so strong, and partly because Shiva wanted to be spiteful as she retreated.

She then felt around for the elusive Siren, barely feeling the flitting consciousness. This time the surges of magical energy were definitely making her sick, and the noise of the alarm she'd inadvertently tripped wasn't helping. Siren floated by again, not even teasing so much as oblivious, distracted by her endless search for Draw points and secret treasures.

The alarm suddenly turned off, and the cold man nodded sharply. "Thank you," he said brusquely, and motioned for her to walk through.

Stunned, Quistis took a tentative step, feeling around inside her mind. Yes, Siren was still there, her vague hazy sense still permeating Quistis' gentle prodding. Was the GF so vaguely attached to her that the alarm wasn't sensing it? Siren's consciousness wasn't strong by any definition of the word, and so perhaps it was being overlooked. Besides, any junctions were better than no junctions.

"How does that work?" she asked the man, noting and hating the nervousness in her voice from being real. The alarm had quickly thrown her off balance, and she hated it.

He gave a little smirk that she was sure meant he wasn't going to tell her anything. "It just looks for the magical signature of a symbiotic consciousness such as a Guardian Force," he said. "A basic sensor." And that, she was sure, was to make her nervous about what kinds of other, more complex sensors they had in place. It was working, at least slightly.

They entered an office - more plush than Dulle's, she noticed instantly - and she took a seat in front of his desk. His light eyes were filled with amusement and more than a hint of malice. Quistis decided to take the upper hand initially - she needed to regain her footing.

"May I ask who you are?" Her voice was angry, petulant.

"Security Agent Tiberaon," he said smoothly, as if that would answer her. He had especially pronounced the _Security Agent_ part to catch her attention. "May I return the question?"

"Athaena Lyman," she said sullenly. "SeeD, Trabia Garden."

As she mentioned SeeD, she saw the same flare in Tiberaon's eyes that she had seen in Dulle's, and the receptionist's. Elsevier was certainly out for SeeD, weren't they? Her question was, of course: in what fashion? Were they alert to recruit SeeD? Or to beware of them?

"Well, Ms Lyman, what can I do for you?" Tiberaon was motionless behind her desk, nothing about his pose casual. "Please understand that after such an outburst I am going to need some detail to explain your presence here. I will not be asking questions to insult you, or intimidate you - but I will be asking questions, and _I will want answers._"

Quistis met his stare full-on, her eyes full of indignant fire. "I spoke with Agent Dulle a couple days ago," she said. "I was sent with a message from the Trabian SeeDs who were out on some mission for you."

His eyes narrowed. "And how did you find out about that mission, Ms Lyman?" She shifted slightly. "Understand," he said, his voice pure evil smoothness, "that I must investigate every potential security leak."

"Vanesa was my best friend," Quistis said, letting fury seep back into her voice.

"What did Vanesa tell you?" He was trying to make his voice kind, but it wasn't working. Quistis doubted that Tiberaon's voice was even capable of being kind.

"She said she was going somewhere, and if she didn't make it back, I was to come here and look for the man called Grey."

Tiberaon smirked. "So you came to speak with Dulle?"

"I came to speak with _Grey,_" she said forcefully. "I met with Dulle and he gave me papers to join the organization. And he told me where to find Grey."

"Oh, did he," Tiberaon said, the same dark smirk on his lips. The way he said it did not bode well for Agent Dulle. "And now you are back. But," he looked her up and down, "with a distinct lack of papers."

"I am pulling my paperwork," Quistis said, knowing that now she was treading on thin ice. "I'm not joining Elsevier."

"Ah." Tiberaon leaned back in his chair, although the pose did not make him look an more casual. "Why?"

"Because." Her eyes narrowed. "I went and found your leader. Yeah, I saw him. How dare you!"

She leapt up out of her seat, planning on launching into a tirade, but Tiberaon was faster, _faster than she could think,_ and he had a gun inches from her face before she had taken her breath.

"Ms Lyman," he said, unfazed. "I would ask you to refrain yourself in my office."

_Gods._ Her heart was pounding; she tried to breathe deeply. _I've never seen anyone move that fast without GF_. She blinked once, twice, calming herself. She still had Siren; but Siren wouldn't help her survive a shot in the face.

"Seifer Almasy," she growled at him over his gun. "How dare you. You're following _Almasy_." Her voice dripped in hatred, smothering the fear (or she hoped). "You expect me to follow him? Does Vanesa know? Did she know that the cause she served was headed by that _bastard? _Does she know that she's wrecked her entire career for _him_?"

To her surprise, Tiberaon's eyes flickered slightly. She wouldn't have seen it had she not been watching. In fact, she wasn't sure if it had been anything save wishful thinking. In one smooth movement he lowered his gun and hid it somewhere - she didn't catch it - and was at the door before she saw him move.

"Please wait here, Ms Lyman," he said, and exited the room. She heard the door lock behind him.

Quistis clenched her fists. Her heart was still pounding, but now from adrenaline as well as fear. Here was her chance to do - something. Whatever it was she was here to do. Hopefully, she closed her eyes, increasing her awareness.

_Siren_, she whispered. _I need you to look for something._

Momentarily she felt the consciousness brush past her, then fade, then brush past again, like fish would swim around a disturbance in their water. _Find,_ Siren whispered as she swam through the ethereal.

_Yes,_ she thought, urgent. _Search the room. Are there any more security measures in this room?_

She felt Siren speed up, like a swimmer who had seen his goal. _Move,_ Siren sang. _Find._ The GF flew around the room, nothing more than a wisp of thought, but Quistis knew if there was anything hidden, Siren would spot it.

_Window,_ Siren whispered, her glow brightening momentarily and then fading to scan the rest of the room. It made sense, Quistis thought. The door was protected by the sensors in the front of the building, but the window was a potential vulnerability.

A tiny puff of disappointment. _Else ... Empty,_ came the song.

Quistis leapt up and headed to the window. Her eyes, though unmagical, could spot the security defenses around the perimeter. She reached out to touch one gently and felt the pulses through it.

_Treasures?_ The pulse of electricity and ethereal was enough to attract Siren.

Quistis bit her lip. She needed to leave something that would allow her a window through the security. She thought about the ethereal stream, and about how she would need her GFs if she were to come back through. She thought about the GF alarm barrier. She thought about Siren's light consciousness, gliding around her. She weighed the pros and cons and decided that in the end, she'd have to trust her instincts.

She rested one long finger out to rest upon the security wire lining the window and felt Siren's call, her urge to explore, to Seek. Closing her eyes, Quistis waited until she could feel her awareness of the magic in the wire build up. She focused on the energy as if it were another person.

_Siren: ReJunction._

It was tricky, and she almost lost it at one point, but Quistis had assisted enough junctions through her teaching to know how to handle a GF and make it attach to what she wanted. Her worry was that augmenting Siren this tiny bit would set off the GF alarm again, but luckily that was avoided. She aligned herself with the ethereal pulse in the wires and - pushed.

There was a bright sigh in her mind as Siren slid over to the wires, and she heard the careening little gasp as her consciousness re-adjusted. Siren was now junctioned into the security system. She was now counting on her (and Shiva's) compatibility with Siren to allow her passage through when she returned later that night. As long as Siren could stay vague enough to remain undetected by the security itself.

She felt around with her mind as if she were about to Draw. Siren was there, but translucent. Or she hoped.

I hope she makes it through the night, Quistis thought, or I'm in trouble.

I hope _I_ make it through the night.

Quistis remained at the window, gazing out, knowing that if there were cameras tracking her she would look just like a weary girl trying to get a breath of fresh air. She took a breath of said fresh air and sighed.

Tiberaon re-entered the room, still moving with that eerie, uncanny fluid grace. "Please sit," he said to her, and there was no graciousness in his voice, only the briskness of a command. She sat.

"Athaena," he said. "I have cleared you for a special debriefing tomorrow morning which should be able to answer all your questions. If your curiosity can hold off until tomorrow, I guarantee to you that everything will become clear."

Quistis took in a deep breath. "You can't do it today? Right now?"

A smile that had nothing to do with pleasantries creased Tiberaon's lips. "The kind of clearance that this debriefing requires comes directly from one of the presidents," he said. "He will be contacted today. We will be unable to have the required signatures and clearance before tomorrow. I estimate around 8:00."

Quistis silently weighed the pros and cons. She would have to come back tonight; Siren was floating in the ethereal line, and every second she was there was a second she wasn't with Quistis, i.e. a second that Quistis was missing one of her valuable GFs. It felt like a distinctly bad idea to leave Siren floating through the building's ether connection any longer than necessary. Which would be more useful, this scary-sounding debriefing? Or breaking into the building at night and sifting through their records?

"I would like to request that the meeting occur at a neutral location."

"Ah." Tiberaon's eyes flickered. "Respectable. However, I am not sure that we can acquiesce."

"Pardon?" Her voice was icy.

"We would like to suggest some neutral, third-party location, preferably public, where none of the participants would be in any sort of danger. However, due to the highly private nature of the information to be discussed, we must conduct the meeting somewhere we _know_ is secure. And the only place that we know of..."

"...is here," Quistis finished for him.

He nodded, smiling the not-friendly smile again. "It seems we must invite you into the dragon's lair yet again."

_Dragon's lair? How fitting_, Quistis thought.

She turned, walking towards the window again, slowly enough to not alarm the man. "I will come at 8:00," she said. "On one condition."

Tiberaon looked at her with a look in his eyes which suggested she had absolutely no place to make any "one condition" demands, but he held silent.

"I am going to tell someone that I am coming. I will not say where and I will not say why, but I will tell someone." She turned to face the man again. "So if you are planning on taking me away tomorrow morning, and making me vanish, there will be one person out there who knows."

Tiberaon nodded. "Again, Miss Lyman," he said in a quiet voice, "quite respectable."

He approached her and held out a hand; it was as cold and firm as Quistis had expected it to be.

"We are in agreement," he said, and this time there was the hint of a question: the sort of question that was a command, a checkpoint; the sort of question an Instructor might ask of an unruly class.

"Yes," Quistis replied. "We are."

_My sincerest apologies. I do not intend to leave this story by the wayside. Coming back to college after my stint in the 'real world' was a lot more difficult than I intended it to be, and than I expected it to be. Though my schedule isn't really too demanding, I have had such trouble adjusting to this life that I haven't felt ready to re-dedicate myself to this kind of stuff._

_Bah. The next chapter is already half-written and hopefully some of you out there remember me and will encourage me to post it in a timely fashion._

_Oh, and I got a kat. If you follow the links in my profile to my website's 'gallery' you can take a look at my darling cutie. :)_


	11. The Questions to the Answer

Chapter Eleven

_The Questions to the Answer_

Quistis had returned to her tiny little hotel room and collapsed on the bed. She was weary: the day's panics and the strain of keeping up her severe poker face had seeped into her bones until she could barely walk, could barely haul herself up the stairs and into the room and onto that tiny little dirty mattress. Plus Shiva had given her a good scolding for the entire fiasco - it had been very hard to even attempt to explain Siren's absence; talking to a GF in any way that made coherent sense wasn't easy in the best and most coherent-sense-making of moods, and Quistis was nowhere near that state - and she was now reeling and slightly nauseous from Shiva's mental onslaught.

Also, she figured that she'd need the rest; tonight was going to be long and dangerous, and she needed her wits.

_Long, dangerous, and it's all my fault. I'm stupid, I'm a failure, I'm going about this all wrong - _

She lay crooked on the bed, Quistis Trepe who was _never_ crooked, never out of place; her limbs sprawled diagonally, one hand clutched to her breast as if to help her breathe. She breathed the dirty air of that hotel room as if it were purity itself. She _heaved_ the air into her chest and _hurled_ it out again. Quistis, who never broke a sweat doing anything.

Too fitful to sleep but too tired to move. She lay on the bed, simply breathing. She wanted to expel every last molecule of Elsevier from her body.

The ceiling was dirty also.

She was tired.

_Failure. I should just report that I'm in over my head, have them send in some SeeDs who are _qualified_ for this kind of thing._

Breathing.

Eventually Shiva got sick of her nervous panting and sent her into sleep, the GF equivalent of a sharp blow to the back of the head. The world around her grew cold and bitter, yet soft, like snow. Quistis sank into the darkness.

She opened her eyes slowly. The world was soft, and out-of-focus: the world she opened her eyes to every morning, before thin-metal glasses framed her poor not-perfect eyes. The almost-blind can see color only (_lucky_): no shapes, no definition, no lines or edges. Simply soft, blended colors, fading from sun-bright to shadow-dark. Colors only. A world built solely in light.

Her blue eyes could see a little more; shapes came to her, some edges, defining the beginnings and ends of her surroundings. She watched from the corner of her hotel room as two figures sat on the bed and spoke: one a lady, crowned in gold; one a man, dark-headed.

"But I don't know what to do," the lady spoke, and Quistis was surprised to find the voice was her own.

The corner-self squinted its eyes and - yes, those were her smooth features, that was her gleaming hair. She squinted harder at the face beside her, decided that the build resembled Headmaster Shain.

"Then think - that's what you're best at." The voice was clearly Squall's.

Corner-Quistis started; she squinted again at the man, trying to bring the softened features into focus. Her eyes didn't have the resolution required to make out the presence of the tell-tale scar - but Squall's hair was not _that_ dark. Or that short and curly.

"There'll be someone following me," Dream-Quistis said. "They'll have sent someone to make sure that I don't do - well, don't do anything stupid, don't do anything like the thing I am exactly about to do."

"Make sure they don't see you," said Squall, from Shain's mouth. "Nobody sees you when there are other people around. Nobody ever saw me. Become lost."

Her dream-self twitched on the bed. "But how? What does that mean? Let them see me - let them see me acting normal. OK, so I leave - I go out for - for dinner. That doesn't help me."

Corner-Quistis' eyes were getting slightly better; she watched a strand of gold fall from the dream-self's tight clip, watched the dream-self tuck the hair behind her ear in a familiar gesture.

"So I find somewhere that there are a lot of people, and I lose myself in them. But then what do I do?"

"The problem with that Encounter-None deal," Irvine's drawl came very clearly, "is that sometimes it's just _too_ strong, and things start noticing you because nobody else wants to come near ya."

The Quistis in the corner was startled at Irvine's voice, but dream-Quistis nodded slowly.

"If I had Diablo," the dream-self said, "I could maybe make it work - throw their attention elsewhere."

"These GFs," Irvine continued, his playful tone now casting from Shain's mouth - for her vision was indeed sharpening, and she was sure beyond a doubt that it was Headmaster Shain's face - "There's no way we'll ever know the full extent of what they can do when we feed them."

"But would Shiva do it?" Dream-Quistis asked herself softly.

"I'm sure she would," Irvine's voice said confidently.

"But could she?" The dream-self shifted abruptly. "How do you know?"

"Because," said Rinoa's voice clearly from Shain's mouth, "I'm a Sensor."

She was becoming increasingly alarmed at each new voice; even the Quistis on the bed was perturbed by Rinoa's light tones; from the corner she saw the dream-self's head snap up sharply.

"A Sensor cannot speak to the GF, but we can - understand each other a little more clearly," said Rinoa-Shain.

"Perhaps," said Dream-Quistis, "perhaps."

"Remind me," said Headmaster Shain, his voice his own, his caring smile his own again, and his hands his own as he reached for her - not the self beside him, but the self in the corner - "remind me to tell you -"

Quistis woke up, panting.

Her mind was whirling. She never dreamed. _Never_. Or if she did, not like this. She had _never_ seen anything so clearly, anything remotely so bizarre -

She sat up slowly. Oh Hyne, what was going on? Was she hallucinating? Had Elsevier drugged her - gassed her room - was she still -

She forced herself to slow her breathing and her thoughts, and took stock of her surroundings. Still in the same dingy hotel room. Still had her duffel bag and her whip. Still breathing strongly with one hand clutched to her breast.

_Calm down. Stop trying to rationalize and explain - it was a dream, and that's as rational of an explanation I'll get._

_Listen to it instead._

She realized that the dream had given her an idea.

_The rational brain is always looking for reasons. Maybe dreams are just the way we sort through life in our sleep._

An hour later, she was finishing dinner at a decently cheap Dolletian restaurant she'd found on the long walk she'd taken around the city. A very long, obvious walk - well, obvious to any Elsevierians who were following her.

What would a normal, bereaving, furious SeeD cadet do? Quistis had asked herself. The answer was not _sit in her hotel room, type up some papers, and go to bed at 9._ The answer was _go for a walk to blow off some steam, get food, then go to a bar and get shitfaced._

She'd done the walk, she'd stopped for a cheap dinner, and she was now off to the bar. It was even an excuse to wear the dark ensemble she had been constructing in her head for her break-in attempt. The bar she chose was busy, crowded, dismal. She could easily get lost on the dance floor and make an un-noticed exit. Hopefully her absence would not be long enough to be notable.

If she even had a shadow - but somehow she didn't doubt it. Tiberaon did not look like the kind of man who sent one off without something to watch you.

She headed to the bar first, ordered a tall beer, looked condescendingly at the man when he asked for ID. _There's no way I look younger than 18,_ she thought. She passed over her Balamb ID, which would not give her name, but would show she was of age to be certified SeeD. That was usually enough.

In this case it was enough as well. He brought her a tall beer - the glass was surprisingly clean. She took a long, grateful sip. Amber ale rushed into her system. She drank slowly but consciously - the cushion of alcohol would help ward off the nausea when she had to re-transfer her junctions.

She stayed at the bar for a while, trying not to attract too much attention, looking for all the world like she was drowning in her sorrows. The beer was slowly but surely drained, and replaced, along with a glass of water (which she drank much more fervently). An hour passed. An hour and a half.

Surely it was dark out there.

Quistis stood up and headed to the dance floor, looking at it with distaste. It was messy and sweaty and drunk. Improper. It raged with too many hands and too many feet and all bodies merged into one mass of writhing, heaving body. She hated it at once.

Tentatively she stepped onto the floor. She had no idea how to dance, no idea what to do; she'd never heard any music sound like this before, all pulse and bass and scream and no _music_. She was in pure and simple hell. Prim Quistis Trepe, the pinnacle of decency, a shining beacon of propriety's rulebook: she _loathed_ this. She recoiled as bodiless hands grasped at her, pulling her into the pulse.

It wasn't so much a timid little woman going _Oh, a mouse_, and running for the nearest chair. This was a blatant Zombie Rat in the middle of her kitchen floor, carrying a chainsaw. This was against everything that had been ingrained in her (unfortunately or no) by her foster family. It was just - wrong.

This wasn't going to work - she was frozen in place.

But she found that the crowd did your dancing for you. You just had to give a little, let your feet not be so rigid, let your arms not be cemented to your sides, not immediately wrench away when someone else's body or arms touched you or slipped past you. The dance was there, a tangible thing. Slowly Quistis relaxed various parts of her body until she felt herself glide into the underlying current. Perhaps she wasn't coasting as easily as many of her comrades (at least she wasn't as bombed as some of her comrades); but she was moving.

Another half-hour passed.

Slowly but surely she slipped herself into a small corner of the dance floor, slid past a couple so tightly entwined they only took up enough space for one. She leaned against the slick wall, catching her breath; then, deliberately keeping her eyes open, she called for Shiva.

The air around her began to cool.

Shiva knew in the GF way of knowing without words. She and Quistis had practiced the trick on their walk around the city. The air temperature dropped a couple more degrees. Quistis was now standing perfectly still. If the trick worked out in the open, that was one thing; for it to work in this close, confined space was something different.

A couple careened off of the dance floor, looking for solitude; ran into her in her corner - and jumped. They hadn't noticed her at all.

_That's enough for me._

Quistis carefully made her way off the dance floor, keeping every step perfectly even, not silent, just un-noticeable. Shiva moved in her mind as the full weight of the aura came into bear; something creaked, like the strap of a briefcase shifting. But the chill held.

Somehow, Quistis had known: if Diablos could cast off an Encounter-Less or an Encounter-None field, her own GF could create something much like it.

Shrouded, Quistis slipped out the back door into the alley behind the pub, an exit saved for those sick with their own ale and revelry. She stayed to the shadows, not wanting to chance her luck; but she moved quickly.

She felt more than heard Shiva's growl; dipping herself into one corner, she froze. The temperature around her dropped steadily; Quistis could feel it, not like one felt the cold winds in Trabia through the clothing, but like a breeze of ice whispering across the surface of her skin. A couple came around the corner, laughing, one stumbling. They vanished.

Weaving her way through the darkness, Quistis finally came to Elsevier's building. She froze in the safety of a long dark alleyway, scanning with GF-enhanced eyes for the guards she knew would be present. That small, detached part of her mind noted: how in the world did Shiva know what she needed? How was Shiva doing this? Yes, Shiva and Quistis had a high compatibility (calculations based on Coulter's standard method): but that was only numbers. This was something else.

The magical presence in her brain was heightening her senses, shadowing her movements, but it was also eating slowly away at her reality. She felt now that the line between her own self and Shiva's self was becoming blurred. If she stepped (mentally) one more step that way, it would almost be as if she had summoned Shiva herself...

But now there was no more time for those thoughts, for the guards had emerged. One guard was patrolling, heading for the rear of the building. The other's shift was apparently up and he headed inside.

Quistis took off lightly across the grass, her feet only flickering against the ground as she _flew_ into a low patch of bushes close to the window where she had junctioned Siren.

_What?_

She was breathing lightly, she noticed, as if the stress and the strain were nothing to her. It had certainly _not_ been her impulse that had carried them across the yard. Quistis Trepe would have watched and waited, for half an hour maybe, until she had obtained all the information she needed. It had been _Shiva_ who had propelled their body across the yard, almost in flight, into the shadows of the bushes.

She had given herself over to Shiva, she realized, at least partially; donated her body for them to share. It had been in the moment where Quistis had asked, _Can you?_ and Shiva had replied, _Yes_, and neither of them had discussed the price.

But again, it didn't matter, because now as half-Shiva she could _feel_ Siren's pull from the window. Funny how she could immediately tell which window. It was as if she could almost see - something, some kind of haze, not a light, but something different about the material of the air.

Shiva asked, wordlessly, and this time it was Quistis who said _Yes._ They ran to the window, ducking beneath it for cover, huddled up against the building. She could feel Shiva and Siren talking, wordlessly, meaninglessly, a quick flick-flick-flick of bunched magic and ethereal pulsing, and then -

Siren did something, stretched her essence until it was _her_ inside the alarm wires surrounding the window, not the ethereal pulse at all. Instantaneously she launched their body through the opening in the alarm system, flipping her body over the sill, and - she could feel for a second the prickle of Elsevier's alarm system, but maybe she couldn't feel it at all, because in the exact instant she crossed the boundary, as if on cue, Shiva and Pandemona de-Junctioned themselves and dove for cover in the recesses of her mind.

Quistis, alone, managed to land quietly if not gracefully, and lay on the floor on her back as the room spun. She was light-headed and slightly nauseous and still in wonderment of what the hell had just happened. Her head and body and movements were all her own, but they didn't feel like it; they felt slow and clammy and confused.

But she had made it. She was back in Tiberaon's office.

She kept to the floor, crawling in the darkness over to the file cabinets in the corner. She flipped on the tiny light on her wristwatch, positioning her body to block the light from the window. The drawers were not labeled, and were locked. She could pick the lock, but then they'd know someone was there. Hopefully the key was in Tiberaon's desk.

After what seemed like an eternity of searching with one tiny watch-light and making next to no noise at all, Quistis did find the key, tucked beneath a pen-holder. She slipped back into the corner and unlocked the bottom drawer.

The tabs on the folders were in some kind of code, she saw: three letters, like the kind you saw in the doctor's office: SRA, SRE, SSO. If she was looking for SeeD she was one drawer short. She tucked the bottom drawer back in and unlocked the next drawer up.

This drawer started at AEB, which was confusing; she pulled the first file, which read AEBMAN, RACHEL. Names. Names of what? AGR, ALA, ALI.

Then she saw ALM and reached for it, her heart leaping. ALMASY, SEIFER. Names of SeeD cadets. The entire drawer was SeeD.

She grabbed Seifer's folder, tucked herself into the corner where her light could not be seen, and opened it. Funny, her brain noted, they labeled Seifer SeeD, but he hadn't passed the exam. Then again, she assumed, neither had Vanesa.

The folder was just a set of records on Seifer, much like she guessed was on file at Balamb Garden. Name, age (estimated), past history (what there was of it), a list of missions he had been on. A detailed record of his exploits with Edea/Ultimecia, which she skipped. And after that, just a notated list of locations.

She skipped to the last entry. _04 March. Sighted in Argun, Budget Inn Suites. Contacted. Refusal repeated. Operation 801 initiated._

She bit her lip. This wasn't an answer. This was not the type of file you kept about your fearless leader, though, was it? What was Operation 801? Something Seifer had ordered? Something Elsevier had done to Seifer?

She decided to skip the folder labeled LYMAN, ATHAENA.

She needed harder evidence. What sort of form would require this Grey's signature? Mission orders, maybe. Operation 801. She closed the drawer and went to the next one up, hoping for the "O"s. Next drawer. Aha, this looked something like it. Operation files.

She paged through until she found one marked 801. Tucking herself back into her corner, she tentatively opened the file, a strange nervousness beginning to eat its way into her stomach.

Operation 801 detailed a holding order against one Seifer Almasy, citizen of Balamb and wanted suspect of the Sorceress' Wars. The order slated a force of six soldiers whose job was to monitor Argun's perimeter and keep Almasy from leaving the city.

Seifer's angry voice. _And I can't leave because the city sentries won't let me._ He hadn't been lying, she _knew_ it.

She pawed through the document, excited, looking for the mission's objective, the operation's statement of purpose. There -

_Since Mr Almasy's presence elsewhere is currently a threat to Elsevier's core mission and leadership, we will take it upon ourselves to detain him in the city under a generous form of house arrest._

Gods.

_Mr Almasy's presence near Elsevier is necessary to continue the distraction ruses that keep the eye of the public away from Grey's real identity. Almasy will be contained within the city limits of Argun until he consents to join or until such a time that the ruses are abandoned._

Quistis gripped the folder blindly and angrily, shaking a bit. She felt that she could be forgiven a little bit of shaking. She'd morphed into her own GF, flown through a window, and proven Seifer's innocence. Shaking was _nothing_.

Seifer _wasn't_ Grey, and there was a nice folder here that proved it. If she ever needed to have it proven. And she was sure that Tiberaon wasn't the only Elsevier employee that kept records.

She was closing the folder when she saw it in the bottom corner: a couple lines of numbers that she assumed upon first glance were filing codes. But she recognized the top set of numbers, a set that would have seemed a random collection of digits to anyone besides Quistis Trepe, probably Xu, and some enterprising secretaries.

Garden Code Certified paper was used to print out emissives of medium importance - bills, mission orders, nothing too drastic or too dull. GCC paper was identified by the Garden from which it had been submitted by the codes printed at the bottom. Quistis recognized the more 'popular' codings just from seeing them so often as an Instructor. In this case, the paper had come from Galbadia Garden.

Quistis didn't recognize any of the other codes, but that didn't mean anything. Galbadian GCC? In these files? In the operation files? Was this some kind of fluke?

She put Operation 801 back into the drawer and pulled out some other random Operation order. Again, on GCC. Again, from Galbadia. Most of the other codes were the same as well. The next file was the same thing. And the next.

You didn't just _find_ an entire ream of GCC lying somewhere for use as scrap paper. Hell, you wouldn't print GCC codes on anything other than an official GCC document. So - why were these GCC documents? Why would Galbadia Garden certify the mission orders from Elsevier?

Funding?

Quistis's mind froze to a halt for a second. Galbadia Garden would have to certify the mission documents _if they were paying for these operations._ Even if they wanted to keep it a secret, they would have to file _something_ with the bank. So they'd make up a new code and hope to pass it off as Bureaucratic Bullshit.

Or was Elsevier, again, trying to frame Galbadia? She couldn't rule that out either. They'd taken such pains to frame Seifer; they might do the same for Garden. It wouldn't last in the long run - neither ruse would - but they'd be enough to distract the medias while everything Elsevier-related ran for cover. And it would do a lot of public damage to the Gardens as well.

Deciding that the risk of standing up was worth it at this point (her adrenaline was so high, Quistis felt that she could have taken on anything), she hunted through the top two drawers, looking for anything interesting or incriminating. Billing records. _I supposed a signed check from Martine isn't going to be in here._

But inside the billing records, albeit in an unmarked folder, was a set of pages marking fund transfers from Galbadian banks, also on GCC paper.

_Galbadia, this does not look good._

Quistis closed the files, put back the key, and returned to the window. She doubted she could perform the same graceful flying leap which had gotten her into the building in the first place without Shiva's help; but she was no slouch. She slipped up over the windowsill and crumpled into the grass.

She extended a mental hand to both Shiva and Pandemona, feeling their strength flood through her again, feeling the strange connection as Shiva activated whatever she did to keep the Enc-None field hovering. Again Quistis could almost see a shimmer in the ethereal lines where Siren's presence lay. Quistis extended the invitation to her as well and felt the sweet song slip into her mind again, the notes soaring as Siren seemed to flow back into her mind. She felt them re-adjusting to each other's presence, re-arranging bits and pieces here and there.

Quistis let out a breath she hadn't realized she had been holding. She'd almost expected an alarm, a guard, anything. And there in the darkness she actually chuckled, silently, at the fact that she had just ruined a perfectly blank record with one (unprovable) charge of breaking and entering.

Compared to other SeeD missions, breaking and entering was tame.

She gave Shiva the reins to coast them back into the grimy bar, where she slipped back onto the dance floor and almost immediately off again, trying to look only tired and intoxicated. She headed out of the bar directly back to her hotel. _Anyone following me will only have seen me go into the bar and then leave it._

Back in her hotel room, she packed together her few things, replaced the black outfit with her mocha-tinted battle garb, and she and Shiva slipped out of the hotel to the train station. (Quistis could almost _feel_ that the pseudo-Encounter-None aura was stronger with Siren's added strength. Plus practice made perfect, didn't it?)

By morning she was standing outside Galbadia Garden, staring up at its rings bemusedly.

What exactly was she here to _do_?

Could she just barge in, demand access to Martine's finance files? Try to get her hands on Galbadian GCC? Snoop around, shrouded by Shiva again, trying not to get caught? What was proper procedure for a Garden subterfuge audit?

She thought of calling up Shain and asking him; but what, exactly, could she ask? _Hey Headmaster, what's the proper procedure for snooping through somebody else's entire file cabinet in the hopes of maybe finding some kind of clue?_ She allowed herself a little chuckle as she realized that Shain was very likely to have some sort of response to her query, real or feigned.

Maybe she could ask to get on that _Plasma_ computer again. There had to be some kind of link to financial records. Money heading out. That's what she needed. And GCC logs. She couldn't just _ask_ for the GCC logs, could she? You didn't just have access to things like that. If she started asking questions like that, she'd start throwing around suspicion like Trabia threw snow. Not like Galbadia needed more suspicion anyway. Blasted Garden protocols.

She pulled out the temporary G-Garden ID card and swiped it. Galbadia was somewhat unfamiliar to her, but she headed up towards Martine's office. Hopefully the Headmaster would be in, and she could just pose her questions to him.

Heading up the stairs, she collected her thoughts. Deep breaths. Her foster-mother's voice in her head: _posture, poise, propriety. Quistis, what will we do with you?_ The posture and the poise were automatic; the propriety was suffering slightly (she was still in her battle-wear) but she could deal with that. The past couple of days had been whirlwinds.

Martine's office was closed and his secretary was out, but Era Maxus was seated at the desk.

She smiled at him in greeting, not entirely prepared for his look of shock. "Quistis?" he blurted out, followed by the speedy correction: "Instructor - er, Investigator - Agent Trepe," he finished, and allowed himself a little laugh at his fumbling words. "Wow. I'm sorry, but this is a really awkward time, and you surprised me. I've been running around like crazy for days, it seems."

The familiarity seemed forced, so Quistis merely continued to smile cooly. "Nice to see you again, Commander Maxus. Is Headmaster Martine here?"

"No, unfortunately, he's out," Maxus said, smiling a little unevenly. "As always. Can I help you with something, maybe?"

"I need to take another look at your email files," Quistis said, wondering when in the past week 'coming up with plausible stories out of thin air' had appeared on her resume. "I might have missed something."

"Anything to help," Era said cheerfully. He entered a couple clearance commands into the computer to his right, which spat out a familiar slim card. "Let's go."

He walked her to the lab, opened the door - and proceeded to come inside with her. She sat down in the chair and tapped the login to the server interface.

Eventually she turned. "Commander, can I help you?"

Era Maxus suddenly looked very nervous and self-aware.

"I'm sorry, Commander," she said in her best Mean-Instructor voice, "but I feel that this should be investigated privately."

"Yes, of course," he said, as if he _hadn't_ been meaning to stand and watch over her shoulder the entire time. "I'll be in the office if you need anything."

She waited until he had left and breathed a sigh of relief she hadn't realized she was holding in. Turning to the computer, she sent a brief plea to Hyne that the setup was similar to Balamb's network server.

It was close enough. The program opened a series of windows comprising the Galbadian computer network. Some of the shortcuts led to the student computer network (a haven for the illegal exchange of media and executables); others led into the actual operating protocols (which of course all looked like foreign languages gone horribly wrong). What Quistis was looking for was a link from this computer into the electronic filing system of Galbadia's secretarial network.

After a little bit of trial and error, she found it. The names and operating system were slightly different, but she had helped Xu with enough electronic filing that she could at least bluster her way around a computer's innards. Hopefully the GCC files were in here and she could cross-reference the numbers she had written up and down her arm and hidden beneath her gloves: this way she could tell whether the GCC pages were real or forged.

After some more blind hunting, she found that archive as well. All Garden Code Certified documents were archived; not because Garden was anal (though it was) but because GCC actually carried some legal authority and no one wanted to make the mistake of re-using or misusing a certified code anyway. It was basically just a brief database of all the filings - little information was stored with each one - set up in a program that would easily spit out the next code to be printed.

She rolled her glove down and searched for the first number. It was a hit. The second and third codes were hits as well. The fourth was slightly blurred from sweat.

Still, it didn't bode well for Galbadia.

She opened the codes. Unmarked dispensations of funding. In these cases the GCC just basically acted as a certified receipt. No real information was required for the database entry. But with these pieces together, G-Garden was starting to look very guilty. Or someone at G-Garden.

Three pages, all entered with Martine's approval. Was _that_ forged?

The door behind her opened and she jumped, involuntarily. Era Maxus walked in, nervous grin still on his face.

"Commander?" she queried.

"I'm sorry, but your hour is almost up," he said. "Find anything yet?"

_That was fast._ She turned back to the computer to log off, not wanting to leave her findings up on the screen. "Not sure," she said, wondering if she could bargain for more time.

Maxus glanced at the screen. "Looking through old funding files, eh?" he asked.

_Gods._ "I ended up in the wrong place," she said slowly. "Your system isn't much like they have in Balamb. Could I get some more time?"

"Yeah," Maxus said eagerly, "come upstairs to the office and I'll print you another card."

As they headed back up to the office, he asked, "So what were you looking for, then?"

"Some personnel records," she said quickly, trying to think of something plausible. "There's some stuff we have at Balamb, I was trying to see if you guys had access to it too."

"What, you looking up Almasy too?"

All of her suspicion nerves suddenly lit up. "What do you mean, too?"

"Well," Maxus said quickly, almost nervously, "all his records are in Balamb's files, right?"

"Commander," Quistis said as they reached the office, "who is looking for Almasy?"

Her nerves were still singing with alarm, and so in retrospect when whomever was behind the office door stepped out and rested the cold barrel of a pistol against the back of her head, Quistis realized she was almost expecting it.

Like any good SeeD, she froze instantly.

"You're looking for Almasy," Era Maxus said, and the switch from nervousness over to calm was so sudden that Quistis knew instantly he had been playing her from the very beginning. "You're looking a little too closely, I might say."

"Commander," she said, her voice carrying every ounce of authority she had left in her, "what is going on here?"

"You'll figure it out," Maxus said, as someone else stepped out from the other side of the door, gripped her hands behind her back, and fastened handcuffs around them. "You're a smart one, Athaena. Can't just take the bait, can you?"

He'd called her Athaena. "You're Gray," she breathed.

"Maybe," Era Maxus replied. "Maybe not. Maybe your dear friend Almasy is. I'm afraid you won't have time to find out. You're coming with us."

_Ha! Cliffhanger! I don't do enough of these._

_Thanks-es for sticking around, and general comments:_

_nynaeve77 (ha, Q throwing a tantrum was just a great mental image; I think she's quite the actress. And Shain will be back soon - I like him way too much.)_

_Chococat2 (is this timely enough? Now the real question is, can I get another in before holiday?)_

_Thugstra (thanks!! I try so hard to not be a silly romance writer (see profile) so I'm really glad you like my plot-ness)_

_Sarady (thank you. Glad Q is believable. The more I write her, the more I like her.)_

_Musical misfit (The truth is out ... :P Are we surprised? Are we pleased? )_

_Shortey (Bah to real life. Thank you.)_

_Dominus (and thank you as well :) )_

_Melete (I like to have fun with the FF8 "world rules", but I still like to stay realistic. Let me know if this chap went too far or not :p )_

_azndreamer1788 (thank you! I hope I can continue to be worthwhile )_

_cwolf2 (Everyone likes Shain, I'm so happy. I tried hard to make him real. Thanks!)_

_Noacat (I LOVE YOUR REVIEWS. You make me so happy. Actually, seeing that you were still reading prompted me to finish up this chapter today! Woohoo motivation!)_

_I'll be taking a brief break from this to update my FFIV parody soon (have you ever been so funny you make yourself laugh?), but I have been picturing the next chapter in my head since Sincerity Cowboy, so ...it shouldn't take too long._

_(AWWWW my kitty just curled up on the pillow next to me ...)_


	12. The Company of Confinement

_Ta, sillies. TY muchos for the corrections. 'Timber' fiasco has been corrected. This is why seventhe should not write at 3am._

Chapter Twelve

_The Company of Confinement_

She'd only been an actual prisoner once before: and the Desert Prison might have been more dreary in appearance, but it was certainly more pleasant in retrospect. She'd had Zell and Selphie with her at the time, and she could remember thinking, _how did I get stuck babysitting these two?_ Selphie had thought it was "Sooo coooool" that they were in prison and had enlisted Zell (once he had overcome his initial panic attack) to help her think up a myriad of overly elaborate escape plans. They had instantly reverted to child-like behaviour, leaving Quistis to act as the adult: the leader.

Even then, she'd had the image: the tall one, the golden one, who automatically took charge and took command and took care of everybody else.

But in the Prison, it had been a projection still: Quistis had never been in a situation like this, and she was nervous. More nervous than Selphie or Zell, she had thought, until she looked into their play-acting eyes and saw the fear, bubbling below the surface, hidden by their faked cheer. It made her feel a little bit better about being afraid; and feeling a little bit better meant hiding it a little bit better, until eventually she had taken all the fear and watered it down into a useful determination.

And so Quistis had slipped back into Instructor Mode.

Every Balamb cadet had to take a one-month seminar called "Prisoner's Etiquette", which discussed what to do in such a situation. The class was based on a controversial text written by a man who had been a prisoner-of-war in Adel's Conflict. It was only controversial because the Gardens disagreed on its importance: it was required reading at Balamb Garden, while at Trabia it was one of four options, choose two, in their "SeeD as a Symbol" study track. Galbadia dismissed it altogether on the grounds that including directions on how to be a prisoner was like teaching teens how to use condoms: a step in what they saw as the wrong direction. Cid had monitored many a disagreement but stood his ground: war was what it was, and his SeeD would be prepared.

And so Quistis had followed the text for guidance. She knew it all too well; it was one of a couple seminars she had applied to teach right before she lost her license.

_Keep yourself in shape. You never know when the right opportunity will present itself, or when physique will come in handy: an escape attempt, a rescue mission, a torture session. You need to be in top form - or as much as you can. Do exercises in your cell to keep your muscles strong. Stretch. These will help you in the long run, and will also keep you entertained, to stave off boredom._

So Quistis had made them all spar, hand-to-hand (although Zell had a fair advantage; eventually he was made to hold one hand behind his back). They'd had contests for situps and pushups and flexibility. They'd done gymnastics off the wall. Zell had bench-pressed Selphie. It had actually almost been fun, except for the entire prison aspect.

_Eat everything they give you: again, it is of utmost importance that you keep your health._ So Quistis had made sure that they all received enough of the meager food given them, to the point where she gave up some of her own food when Zell wasn't looking. _Get sleep in short intervals. Staying awake constantly will do you no good and much harm. Sleep for short periods of time and then take account of your surroundings._ Quistis had put them all on a watch schedule. She had made sure that only one person slept at a time, so the two conscious members could always make conversation. _Keep your mind stimulated._ She'd taken part in the "Wild and Crazy Booya Booyaka Escape Plan" discussions, as they had come to be called, and had posed some situations she had been given in her Instructor's Certification.

It had made her feel a lot more confident to have been able to take charge: to have successfully cared for everyone in the cell. To have kept them all in shape to the point where Zell could run off and recover their weapons and they could all make a run for it. To have actually been the leader she had been seen as: to be as tall as was required.

Now, here, she was alone. No one to spar with. Or bench-press.

_Quistis Trepe works best alone ...right?_

It wasn't a cell so much as a room in some abandoned warehouse somewhere. The walls had once been whitewashed plaster, but were now dusty and a little mildewed. The door _had_ been replaced with the standard iron bars, swinging on clean hinges, obviously new additions. There was an unimpressive but clean cot against one wall. The barred door was the only way she could see out.

She'd been taken back to Argun for imprisonment; she could tell she was in Esthar roughly by the time it had taken in that little disgusting hovercraft thing they had. She'd literally been counting the minutes; it had been horribly uncomfortable. She had assumed it was Argun from the start, but then she'd seen Dulle on an errand, which had confirmed her suspicions. Apparently the Fat Man had been demoted.

They'd stripped her of her GFs - Siren as well, this time - and her brain felt all jumbly and empty and rearranged. And she'd been dreaming as well: she remembered now, constant quick re-Junctioning or dis-Junctioning loosened the brain's connections, which usually resulted in abnormal dream cycles. The dreams were coming full-force, and while none of them were as eerily meaningful as the Shain dream, they were all equally as bizarre.

The GFs were still in her head, but there was some field in the room (maybe on the entire floor; maybe the entire complex) that was clamping down on them and making them unreachable, let alone useable. Stealing another person's GF was punishable by Garden Law at a very high level due to the mental and submental damage it did to a person. Quistis was glad that they had left hers alone, but was worried: it implied that the involvement of Garden was very high, if Elsevier was aware of this rule.

So Quistis set her internal clock, and slept and woke at deliberate intervals. Having no windows she couldn't check her internal clock by day and night, but she continued to keep schedule. She did sets of situps and pushups and agility exercises, which made the guards snicker. Once a day she was escorted to a shower and twice a day (unless otherwise requested) she was escorted to the toilet.

They hadn't beat her, hadn't tortured her, hadn't touched her. The jail was musty from disuse but much more comfortable than the Desert Prison. But the detached part of her mind had to whisper: even when they're torturing you, it means that you have something they need. They don't _need_ you.

The problem with confinement, she began to remember, was the introspection. With no one to talk to you talk to yourself; and when you talk to yourself, the easiest thing to talk about is _yourself_.

Quistis didn't like talking about herself. She didn't like thinking about herself. Every time she tried to open up, to chip away at the gold and show someone the flesh underneath ...well, she ended up _talking to a wall._

Not every time, though. She felt her face blush slightly as she remembered her last _real_ conversation with Shain. She hadn't meant to let him in - _Shain, of all people_ - but -

Shain hadn't rejected her or mocked her or insulted her. He had taken her words calmly and looked at them like a photograph and then given her words of his own, not just words but precious ones, a picture in return.

And she'd dreamed about him, that crazy dream where he spoke in other voices and gave her advice. A crazy, GF-induced dream, but a dream nonetheless.

Shain would probably think it was funny, but what would she say? "Hey, Headmaster, don't freak, but I had this hilarious dream about you the other night, and you had Rinoa Heartilly's voice."

Her imagination produced Shain's voice: "Kinky."

She'd _dreamed_ about him! Quistis Trepe, dreaming about Headmaster Shain Sheridan. Didn't that just take the cake and sound horribly romantically cliched when in fact it was nowhere near remotely anything like that. Nothing. And Instructor Trepe doesn't talk in long unpunctuated run-on sentences either.

Quistis lay carefully back onto the cot with a sigh.

----

How many days had she been here? It was very irresponsible of her to lose track. She was counting hours, regulating her sleep patterns, but in doing so had forgotten to keep track of the greater picture: how many days?

The ceiling was just as dingy as the walls, spotted with little tiny mildew colonies. Quistis looked at them for a while, trying to get her mind out of its rut; there was a grouping over in one corner that, if she lay at a slightly different angle, made her think of a dog-face. Oh good - now Angelo could keep her company. Angelo was a sweet dog, with an intelligent look and eyes that often held amusement; and sometimes he tilted his head when you spoke to him. The mildew-shape in the corner had this image, Angelo with his head cocked, looking at you with those big liquid eyes.

She remembered Angelo and Rinoa, in the girl's early days with the SeeDs, trying desperately to show that she was a good enough fighter to fit in. Much bluster and little substance, but enough bluster that she could do whatever she wanted to do, and you believed she'd do it with nothing but her faith in her dog and a second-hand weapon like that Blaster Edge. Quistis had helped the girl upgrade that as soon as possible; Rinoa did have real skill with the ranged weapon, but even the best carpenter would only get so far with a plastic hammer.

Rinoa's skill with Angelo had been pure genius, however, and Quistis (again, in the past) had thought of asking Rinoa to come to Garden and work a month-long seminar on canine training; many of Quistis' Limit Break students were having difficulties coming up with moves effective enough to fully utilize the adrenaline punch of a Limit Break, and Quistis thought the idea of a training companion would be brilliant. But then - again - Rinoa inherited Ultimecia, and became the only thing Garden would be interested in - the Sorceress.

Quistis realized that she must have spent a good deal of time churning ideas over in her brain, trying to think of ways to help Rinoa fit in, to help her feel like she mattered. Even though the girl rubbed her the wrong way, it wasn't like there was any _dislike_ between the two. Apparently even in the midst of something as horribly confusing as Sorceress-chasing Quistis's brain fragments could spin on their own, coming up with Rinoa-related compliments. It had probably been more to appease Squall than for any other reason.

She wanted to talk to Rinoa, too: ask her, "Have you ever suspected Seifer of being capable of lots of great evil and treachery? Oh wait, yeah, he did try to feed you to Adel, huh." No, she couldn't say anything like that; she'd have to feel her way into it, try to pick up Rinoa's feelings on the entire matter before the girl caught on to the purpose behind the questions.

What would Rinoa do when she found Seifer was alive? Would she be glad? (They had been lovers, once, if only in some sense of the word.) Would she be angry? (He had betrayed her, tried to kill her, and tried to kill Squall.) Would she be indifferent? (Seifer had kind of dug his own hole.) Would she immediately march out, armed with Angelo and Angel Wing, and demand Seifer's head on a golden platter? (Like Shain might have done.)

Quistis realized with a short jolt that she couldn't even be sure that Shain hadn't gone looking for Seifer himself. With her out of the way, Shain could find him, probably easily, and take Trabia's revenge. All it would take was a squad of Elites and one short fight.

She wondered what Shain's primary weapon was.

But no, that wouldn't be Shain's style. He wouldn't go in secret and take care of the 'problem' in such a short way. He wouldn't go behind her and betray her like that, would he?

Betray her? As if they had some sort of binding contract.

Friendship was a sort of contract, wasn't it?

Quistis didn't know, honestly. She'd never had many friends, growing up. She'd always been a little out of place: a little bit taller, older, more mature than the ordinary kids she'd longed to be like. She made other children uneasy, her golden perfection magnifying everyone's flaws. And her tendency to want to care for everyone she met (the neverending quest to become Big Sis Quis) placed her in the _older, adult_ category.

Her upbringing hadn't helped, either. Her foster parents had been terrifyingly old-fashioned folk. Her foster-father worked all day at a bank somewhere and her foster-mother stayed home and spent her hours cooking, cleaning, or instilling the two into her new foster-daughter.

Her mother's one requirement upon adoption was that she wanted a _girl_.

Instead she had gotten Quistis, golden-haired and blue-eyed as any mother could wish for. Quistis, who was tall and lean instead of short and sweetly plump. Quistis, who spoke with a grandeur five times her age even at a young six, when she should be demure and shy. Quistis, who took pride in the fact that she could - and did - beat the boys into bloody noses and tears (but only when she jumped on them in surprise. If they knew she was coming, she was a sure loser). Quistis, fiercely intelligent and curious, so sharp with both that she could and often did cut herself on her own tongue; when she should be sweet-voiced, unopinionated, reserved.

_Posture, poise, propriety._ Her foster-mother's mantra hammered into her, repeated with every step. Her mother's idea of posture was sitting straight-backed in a chair while strapped (or so it felt) into a ridiculous day-gown, looking alluring and sweet and _fragile_. Poise was pouring the tea correctly. Propriety was biting her tongue when the Visitor of the Day made some crack about a 'woman's place' and simply giggling rather than reaching for the teapot and cracking Visitor upside the head.

Quistis and her foster-family had parted ways when it became obvious that Quistis's ideas and dreams led her down a horrible path, a _man's_ path (breaking every one of the Propriety Rules); Quistis wanted to lead and take care of and create and design and direct. The family decided to ship her off to Garden as a charity case, to get her out of the way. Her foster-mother at this point had realized that the daughter she had adopted would never be a _girl_; the foster-father barely noticed. No one shed tears.

It had caught up to her, two years later, in the wrath of Garden's training. Stress and change and sleep made her physics all strung out and she had descended into a pseudo-depression that only Kadowaki and Xu knew about anymore. She'd realized that she'd failed - again. One more in a long trend. She hadn't lived up to expectations. It didn't matter that she couldn't - she had _disappointed_, the most evil of curse words in the Trepe dictionary. And thus was born the horrendously fierce Trepe Determination: the power she found in willing herself to do the impossible.

The rules had produced who she was today. In over-pushing her daughter to be so _girly_ the foster-family had managed to create a strong young woman - yes, _woman_ at age eleven - who had no qualms about looking men right in the eyes. Her posture was tall and confident and intelligent; her poise was battle-ready; and she knew propriety like she knew the Garden Rulebook, by heart.

It had earned her respect, admiration, rumours, and eventually her SeeDship and her Instructor's License. But it hadn't earned her friends. The closest she'd come was Xu, older sister and friend and guardian all in one, who had been torn from her when both grown-up girls grew up and graduated.

----

Seifer, Seifer, Seifer.

If there was one thing she had to get out of jail for, it was to prove Seifer's innocence. Quistis wasn't so sure why this was her one dominating reason - she'd rather it had been _so that you're not in jail any more_ or even something like _so that you can finger Maxus and watch him rot in jail_. But she felt almost guilty; she'd doubted Seifer, even accused him.

And Seifer was in danger, though if there was one thing Seifer was good at it was protecting himself. Attacking Seifer with anything less than a squad of highly-trained SeeD cadets (as they'd done during the Ultimecia ordeal) was just asking for punishment. Punishment that came in the form of bad words, dirty cigarette smoke, and Hyperion.

Quistis wondered. She'd been able to fire off a quick email to Xu from the _Plasma_: an email from a dummy account that only contained the GCC codes and was signed IQ (a nickname for Instructor Quistis that Xu had given her and had thought was hilarious). She knew that if anyone would recognize GCC codes, if would be Xu. She only hoped that the virus filters didn't eat it or anything.

And Xu wouldn't know what to do with the files once she pulled them up on the computer, but at least she'd see the unmarked dispensations. Quistis had no doubts that Era Maxus would slip into the system and change the GCC somehow to cover his tracks, now that he knew she'd been looking at it. But this way it was two people against Era's one. Unless he had more on his side within Garden bureaucracy. Quistis shivered.

But it didn't seem fair to her, even for _Seifer Almasy_, who had been a belligerent jerk even at the best of times and made the spawn of Cerberus look like happy puppies at his worst moments. For someone as fiery and independent as Seifer to be trapped in a shithole like Argun, run around from apartment to apartment or hotel to hotel, probably paying his rent and fees in anger and rat-slaughter: to Quistis it was a disgrace.

Also Seifer had been one of her students, and she took his success very personally.

Where'd she gone wrong? She'd misread Squall and Seifer both. Big Sis Quis still lived inside her head, buried under years of Shiva-Junction and Coulter's Handbook, and when the Instructor had looked at them for the first time Big Sis had reared up inside her neatly ordered mind and produced two little sparks. Big Sis had been drawn towards Squall (him being the one who needed Big Sis-ing) and had been repulsed from Seifer (who had usually thrown things at her). And the Instructor had misread these little sparks completely, becoming increasingly short and not tolerant with Almasy and his disrespectful behaviour; while she favored Leonhart beyond a lot of things and a lot of people, to the point where she found herself requesting to be his Fire Cavern Aide. To the point where she figured that, not having had a crush before, this must be one. To the point of _misunderstood love_.

But she'd still been _connected_ to them both by the sparks. Why else would she have run after Seifer in Timber, where Seifer lost himself to Edea-Ultimecia-Matron?

Probably to save her good name. If one of her own students went wacko on the First Evening News In Eight Hundred Centuries, wouldn't she be held partially responsible? Even only partially?

She'd wanted to _protect_ Seifer, subconsciously, as she'd always wanted to protect Squall. As she'd wanted to protect Selphie and Zell in the Desert Prison. As she'd wanted to protect Rinoa when they first met; though Rinoa hadn't been of the Orphanage, she'd still exuded the same lost-child sense that tapped into Quistis's instinct.

The big-sis instinct, the instinct of height, the instincts of posture, poise, propriety. The Trepe Determination. What made Quistis so tall?

Everything, and nothing. Nothing save Quistis herself.

----

Balamb Garden's policy on prisoners-of-war was Cid's personal policy, and it was simple: _We will always come for you._

She was starting to worry. It had been long enough, hadn't it? Wouldn't someone start looking for her?

Who would know where she was, though - Squall and the others wouldn't know where to find her.

But Shain would. Her suitcases, still at Trabia. He'd realize something had happened; somebody would come after her, and she couldn't be _too_ hard to find.

Would Shain bother to come himself? She'd been so _cold_. But she _had_ to. She was going to be Balamb Headmaster and it wouldn't _do_ for the Trabian Headmaster to know her innermost heart-workings. Shain could just notify Squall and then Balamb could send a relief team.

She realized with a jolt that she was almost _hoping_ Shain would come. Why? So he could laugh and say _I told you so, I told you Argun was dangerous_? She'd have to apologize and eat words and junction herself to the teeth to get past him again. And she'd do it with a smile, gladly, and then slip out the back door to run off after Elsevier again.

But she did. She wanted him to come, because it meant that he _cared_.

She wasn't Trabia Garden's problem. He had no responsibility to her -

_Cared? **Cared?**_

Quistis Trepe didn't think in terms of caring and feeling and friendship. Why would she _care_ whether or not Shain cared about her?

I'm getting lonely, Quistis thought, eyeing the patch of mildew that looked like Angelo's face. I'm getting lonely, and talking to mildew dogs, and weaving romantic nothings out of someone that I just want to be friends with.

_Quistis Trepe works best alone ...right?_

Is it so bad to want a friend?

------------------------

**Pppppp;;;;;;o**

_That is from my cat, who likes to step on things. Although I did move it from the portion of the story where she inserted it, I thought the message important enough to include here, as a finale to the chapter._

_One of the things which disappointed me about SC was that I lost the introspective angle; so here is my attempt to deliver a couple of Quistis-images. This chapter is in part for Enkida, the author of _Growth_ (a fantasmic FF7 fanfic featuring a gorgeous Vincent, an adorable Red, and an undeniably Yuffie-ish Yuffie in a very cool plot I wish I had thought up myself), who paid me a greatly appreciated compliment and made me want to finish this chapter. Hooray motivation! The rest is dedicated to all my other reviewers; I've broken 100 reviews and I feel **so** honored. The drinks are on the house!_

_Please read _mirrorfeather_ if you haven't already. It's one of those things you write when you're drunk on being back at your parents' house for Christmas like a child: it makes no sense, and I love it._


	13. The Return to the Battle

_omg: **Reno and Vincent. **_Www(dot)adventchildren(dot)net - screens._ (fangirl drooling)_

_Those of you who liked the introspection, thank you: the point of my writing is to let us see a little bit more of these poor ignored-by-Square characters, to let us see what goes on in their heads. The point is also to have a whopping good time at it, so for those who would have liked some action, I hope this chapter doesn't disappoint. I'm excited about it. _

**Ch****apter Thirteen**

**The Return to the Battle**

She'd definitely lost track of the days at this point.

It couldn't have been that long, she knew, nowhere close to like a year, or even a couple months. But it had been disorientingly long enough for her.

Her life was a bizarre schedule of brisk sit-ups, pushups, athletics, and long conversations with the mildew on the ceiling. She'd tried a lot of things. She'd tried talking to the guards; they answered her politely, but with disinterest. She tried breaking out of the door; without Junctioned strength, she knew she'd never get it. She tried bribing random people she saw in the hall, telling them Cid Kramer would make good on any offer; they answered her politely, but with disinterest. _Damn._

So she kept to these days, minutes tracked by an internal clock no longer calibrated to real-time, sections of days marked only by disjointed sets of athletics and the inherent sense that time was passing. Her muscles were enjoying this long break from deliberate usage and despite her best efforts, were joyfully atrophying.

Then, one day, the lights went out.

Quistis had been sitting on the floor, her back against the bed. Her senses took the full and sudden plunge into the darkness without warning; she was completely surrounded in the stuff, eyes and ears full of it -

A small trace of terror began to crawl up her spine, fueled by the creepy emptiness of the space under the bed, on the small of her back, where tiny little hands might reach out to grab her -

Freaked, Quistis slowly moved herself up onto the bed, so that her back was pressing up against the wall. The solidity of the plaster against the entirety of her spine was reassuring. Quistis had never really liked the dark: you were never in complete control of yourself or your surroundings. It wasn't that she was scared. Really.

Although the little twingy shivers, and the fact that her hands were clenched into fists, was telling her otherwise. Her heart was pounding, and there was a strange nauseous feeling in her stomach that was something like absolute terror. She was pressing her entire back into the wall with so much force she figured there'd be an imprint of her spinal cord when she moved. If she moved. But with the wall at her back, nothing could sneak up behind her.

She focused on breathing, and on adjusting her eyes to this darkness.

She _hated_ darkness because it _was_ a loss of control. It was a loss of everything that gave her power. She'd grown to hate it with her foster-family, trying to sleep in a dark and unfamiliar room (it had always been unfamiliar, even after years). The pain in her chest and terror in her spine was like a polite form of a panic attack: the fear of the unknown. She loved challenge and mystery, yes: but she loved the ones you could _see._

Through the bars that were her door she began to see a hazy, very faint light. Emergency bulbs were lit in alcoves, positioned in increments down the long hallway. Their faint glow was cutting across the darkness.

She couldn't _stand_ not being able to see, so she decided to move over closer to the door. Maneuvering carefully off the bed, she made her way to the door, scooting around the perimeter of the room so that her back never left the wall. Once by the door, she pressed herself up against the wall perpendicular to it. This way she could see into the dimly lit hallway and still have the firm reassurance that her back was unexposed.

It was so _silly_, but she couldn't help it. And besides: she wasn't really herself after so many constantly-lit days.

There were noises: some strange scufflings which she assumed were Elsevier employees; either Preparing for Trouble or Getting the Hell Out. She heard whispering down the hall, and what sounded like shouting from upstairs.

Then there was a long, drawn-out whine, like from an electric circuit, being gradually but increasingly overloaded, some electronic system reaching its capacity and being driven to excess -

And then a longer, deeper shudder, which shook the entire building. Quistis felt the vibration in the soles of her feet. The whine had died; the halls were silent. The nausea was growing, and she gripped her hands in fists to ward it off. Her brain felt fuzzy and vague. Some major system had just somehow failed; maybe they had been trying to turn the line back on.

She shifted herself, curious in spite of her fear, and moved towards the door.

Her head suddenly filled with static, a strange white noise; but she realized that around it, she could finally feel her GFs again. Encouraged, she took the last step, pressing her forehead against the door. They were clamoring inside her consciousness: she could distinctly pick out the three very different mental signals. There was still some kind of barrier, a buffer, inside the room which prevented her from Junctioning or Summoning - but outside her cell, the barrier had fallen. She supposed the static in her head was the result of the waning field at the edge of her door. It was discomforting, and probably was what made her so nauseous, but the comfort of feeling Shiva once more won out.

So Quistis decided to wait, her head leaning against the bars of her door, the metal warming slowly under her skin. Maybe the anti-magic fields had been overloaded and disintegrated.

Then, suddenly, there was a loud crash which echoed down a stairwell. The crash sounded intensely like battle.

All of her muscles tensed up, her body at the ready, instant response well-trained into her blood and bones. _Battle?_ It was too much to hope for, but maybe someone had finally come to get her out. And even if they weren't here for her, this could be her one chance to make an escape - finally - especially if the anti-GF wards had died.

She was filled with equal parts excitement and desperation. The fear had faded away in her determination to get out.

She kept her eyes trained on where she knew the stairwell was. There were dim flashes of light: gunfire or grenades, maybe, or residue from magic. The light which wove its way through the stairs and down onto her level grew brighter and brighter. Whatever it was, it was coming.

Then, suddenly, the stairwell had blazed up with light; silhouetted against it was a dark figure, which leapt from the stairwell and took a couple cautious steps.

Cautious and _familiar_ steps.

_"Squall?"_

Shocking Quistis Trepe speechless is one thing, an admirable feat in itself.

Shocking Quistis Trepe _into_ speech is another thing entirely.

Squall looked down at her outburst, a hiss against the sounds of battle behind him, and he brought his wrist up to his mouth. Quistis recognized the delivery of a confirmation message through one of Garden's prized (and expensive) geo-synch communicators.

She had always thought they'd come for her, but somehow she'd expected something a little more - well, diplomatic. Squall breaking in to Elsevier's basement was strangely - espionage-ish. And who was his backup? Did he _have_ backup?

Squall looked up at her, but then turned his gaze back to the glowing stairwell. He stretched out one arm, hand up in his familiar casting stance; but no, he wasn't casting, he was reaching for something.

Someone. Out of the stairwell came a faintly glowing, ethereal form, floating almost on tip-toe, gentle wings outstretched. Her eyes were closed; it was clear that the blaze of light Quistis had seen was residue from one of the girl's more powerful spell concoctions.

_Rinoa?_

The detached part of Quistis's mind recognized that the girl had slipped into her Berserk'd Limit Break and that, somehow, Squall was guiding her. Probably a function of their Sorceress-Knight bond, it noted.

The rest of Quistis's mind was still staring, its hypothetical jaw dropped.

Squall walked carefully down the hall, Rinoa trailing him, floating behind with her eyes closed. As he approached Quistis's room, he stopped, eyeing the bars on the door. Quistis took two steps back: if he was calculating Lionheart's capability to cut through metall, she didn't want to be a part of it.

But instead, he closed his eyes as well, and made a strange gesture, much like Rinoa's casting gesture; the floating figure behind him echoed it. Quistis heard the electric sizzle of lightning a mere second before the door slid open.

Rinoa had accessed the unlocking mechanism. With her magic. And Squall guiding her.

Quistis couldn't give this any more thought because Shiva seized the opportunity, diving from her dormant recess of hibernation into Quistis's consciousness, dragging Siren and Pandemona with her. The sudden blast of magic was too much for her, along with the shock of the dark and the rescue and - she staggered back to support herself, one hand braced against the wall of the hallway behind her.

Squall, hearing noises from the stairwell, dropped into fighting stance. Rinoa leveled herself behind him and bowed her head, hands outstretched in casting. A thin protective shimmer radiated outward from her until it surrounded both Squall and Quistis, half of a transparent globe.

"What the hell is going on?" Quistis finally managed to ask.

Squall looked over at her, his eyes narrow with determination. "Status report," he said, gesturing to the geo-synch on his wrist; another mission operative must have been on the other end, ready to respond. "WJMS update, Quistis, and now."

She pulled her fragmented thoughts together. "Weapon: missing, confiscated, location unknown. Junction: three-GF alignment, central Junction Shiva, supported by Siren and Pandemona. Magic -" She closed her eyes briefly, scanning the strength of her reserves. "Probably preparation rank eight, with magical junctions leaning right now toward health, strength, and stamina. Supplies: also missing and confiscated."

"Good," Squall said, relaxing his grip on Lionheart momentarily. "Keep Junctions aligned as so: we're here to get you out, so you'd better be able to keep up. As for the others, here."

Quistis noticed Squall was wearing one of Garden's specially developed Battle Packs. It was built like a backpack, but with one large canvas-mylar strap which crossed the chest diagonally from shoulder to waist, with a clasp in the middle not unlike a seatbelt. Research had shown that backpacks were needed for supplies on long journeys, but that the dual straps on a traditional backpack hindered combat. Thus, the single strap, designed to stay close to the body and away from the battle.

Squall unclasped the pack and swung it off his back, handing it to Quistis. "Open it," he said, and for the first time Quistis saw the small hint of amusement glinting in his eyes. There was something protruding from the top, not able to fit entirely in the bag. Quistis undid the zipper the rest of the way and - _oh, my._

The protruding piece had been part of a fiberglass-type rod, slightly longer than Quistis's forearm; and as she removed that from the bag she noted the d-ring on the other end with two long tails attached. Eyes widening in surprise, she pulled out the rest of the whip: the tails were a treated sort of black skin, almost scaly, slightly shorter than Save the Queen had been. The scales were mildly sharp; she drew a gloved finger across it and was surprised when it snagged slightly. At the end of each was a cluster of barbs, as if the tail of a rattle-snake had suddenly grown fish-hooks. The ends were weighted, obviously meant to deliver a heavy punch as well as flesh-tearing damage.

"Newest model," Squall said by way of explanation. "It's called the _Medusa's Ire_. Will it work?"

She lifted it and took an experimental swing; the two tails moved almost in unison, snapping suddenly in the empty hallway. The longer handle would take some getting used to, but a two-handed weapon would have more power to it. The tails were lighter than the Queen had been, but the weights on the end counter-balanced them nicely. She had wanted a dual-tailed model to experiment with for some time now. She swung again, her body pivoting slightly as she took in its exquisite balance and precision.

"Yes," she said grimly, and Squall gave her a small - but complete - smile.

She fastened the Battle Pack onto her back as Squall lifted his wrist to his mouth. "Trepe is armed," he said. "Calling retreat. Be ready."

Squall headed for the stairwell again. There'd been little noise during their brief conversation, and Quistis realized this was because Squall and Rinoa had cut their way through a lot of Elsevier's defenses to get to her level. Rinoa, mostly; she saw charred turrets, smoking monitor cameras, slick hallways, and lots of unconscious employees. Apparently, having Squall to guide her helped the girl to focus her spells - lightning on electric machinery, Sleeps or Stops on humans. It was uncanny.

Quistis swallowed. _No wonder Elsevier is after Rinoa. Sorceress Rinoa. Hyne, she was crazy to come here. What if they got her?_ For a brief second her mind was back on Garden protocol: _How will they report this?_ She wished, half-hopingly, for Trabia's Sensor to come and take a stroll through here; she'd _die_ to read the report on this.

But the upper levels had taken the opportunity to bolster their defenses; there were still only two exits, and they were surrounded by strangely-uniformed soldiers like the strangest police bust in Esthar history. Squall was heading for one, but had stopped, back leaning up against the wall like the world's strangest spy movie. His eyes closed momentarily as he anchored the floating Rinoa around a corner where she couldn't be seen and raised his wristband to his mouth, whispering.

_Elsevier has an army?_ Somehow, she wasn't surprised. It was at least a security squad, but they looked pretty rough - _Is that really a grenade launcher? _She tightened her grip on Medusa's Ire; it was unfamiliar, but reassuring.

A weapon. She was armed. Squall was here - Rinoa was here - _she was going home._

Quistis narrowed her eyes and stared in the general direction of the uniformed Elsevierans as determination swelled in her heart.

Squall gestured, and she approached, leaning in until their foreheads were buzzing with almost-touching static. "Rinoa's Sensing and Ragnarok's scans match," Squall whispered. "There aren't many of them - maybe two dozen. They do seem to be armed."

"Two dozen," Quistis whispered, half in worry and half in anticipation. Two dozen, against three - well, against two and a half. For all her fierceness, she was sorely out of shape, and she knew it.

"Look, just follow Rinoa and I and try not to get hurt," Squall said brusquely, and Quistis bristled as he peeked around the corner again and then closed his eyes, apparently communicating with the Sorceress. Quistis felt suddenly and violently left out - and jealous.

Not of Rinoa, really; not in that way, not any more. But - it was supposed to be the other way around - Squall Leonhart and Quistis Trepe, two Garden prodigies, protecting Rinoa Heartilly, the civilian. Why did _she_ have to stay in the background and not get hurt? All of a sudden Quistis was the one on the sidelines. And as much as the practical half of her wanted to say, _look you halfwit you just said yourself you're out of shape_: that didn't make it hurt any less...

Squall's eyes opened slowly, gleaming with a battle-hardened look Quistis recognized as very, very dangerous for those on the receiving end. "Ready?" he mouthed to her, more gesture than noise. She nodded, once, briskly.

"Rinoa, go _now,_" Squall whispered.

Rinoa's eyes opened.

From that point Quistis could barely follow what was happening: she felt rather than saw the subtle double glow of Protect and Shell on her skin as Rinoa lit up, even brighter, as if she were on fire. Gleaming in gold and silver, a firework, the Sorceress was suddenly around the corner. There was a quick round of bullets - stopped by Rinoa's outstretched hand in an odd, eerie parody of a parade Quistis had seen once - and then someone yelled, "No, stop shooting! That's the Sorceress!"

Quistis barely had time to register that she was now glowing with even more strength - she recognized the pulse of Haste as well as the dangerous tint of Aura - as Squall pulled her around the corner and yelled, "Go for it!"

Rinoa's eyes were now bleak and empty gleams in her translucent body, and she stretched her arms out, letting a barrage of pure magic hurl itself down the hallway and out the door. Quistis recognized some tactical Sleep and Stop spells mixed in with a good deal of damage; mostly lightning-based. But at that point she and Squall were running after the Sorceress, who was careening down the hallway, almost-running as she floated in midway.

_I've never - seen anyone cast - that much - that fast,_ Quistis's brain panted at her as she ran. This was followed by the somewhat muted thought: _Squall is daft to let her take point anyway. What does he think he's doing?_

But the Elseverians had stopped shooting -

_Oh Hyne, they want her alive. Squall, are you crazy?_

Rinoa brought her arms down in one sharp movement and the door exploded outwards in a giant burst of Flare, taking a good portion of the wall with it. She and Squall stumbled out in an afterthought, Squall's normal battle-grace having taken a toll - _no, he's busy with Rinoa,_ Quistis realized.

And then the enemies were upon them. Squall was slashing upright with his blade, and then down, knocking out a second pseudo-soldier with the hilt. Rinoa remained anchored, feeding into their Protect spells as those in the back began to tentatively fire grenades. Quistis took two grim swipes with the Medusa's Ire and then, feeling the Aura spike, let loose a blast of Bad Breath, which left an entire line of soldiers incapacitated.

"Go," Squall called, an invitation rather than a command. She followed, feeling the adrenaline begin to pool in her unused muscles. As if taking a cue from Selphie, Rinoa let loose a long stream of Blizzaga; Quistis lost count after five, raising the long fiberglass handle of her new whip to block a strike and then knock a soldier to the ground.

There was a pause, and Quistis let her own eyes flutter momentarily, calling forth her White Wind. No harm in being overly cautious; and besides, if she remembered correctly, Rinoa was incapable of actual healing when tranced. Although with this new Squall-Rinoa combo she wouldn't be surprised if the girl could still _summon._ This was _unreal._

There was a whirring noise above her, and Quistis's brain recognized the hyperjets of the Ragnarok, hovering above them. Squall looked at her, a directive clear in his eyes: _Get Ready._ She wasn't sure what their mode of exit would be, but at this point, she'd take anything -

A body collided with her suddenly, knocking her off-balance; she kicked out, flailing against it, but in doing so she dropped the long handle of the Medusa's Ire. Dropped, violently. It went flying off to the right and behind her and in a strange instinctive gesture Quistis reached out and grabbed the tail end (praying the material of her gloves would hold) before it could sail out of her reach.

Surprisingly, the patch her hand landed on was smooth and tailored; she glanced down in surprise, noting a section of the tail had been grafted with sturdy black leather. _What?_

But the body had, apparently, realized what it had hit, and she felt somebody grab for her again. Out of sheer surprise and luck more than anything she writhed out of his grasp, stuttered steps dodging the man's weight. She felt the whip of the Medusa's ire become taught as the solid handle reached the end of its arc -

_Oh._ She neatly leapt backwards and swung, watching as the fiberglass handle connected with the man's face, just like a one-ended nunchuck. Her aim wasn't nearly as good as it had been with the whip, but the handle was solid and packed quite a punch. Selphie would have been thrilled. The man went down, and her head shot up, looking for Squall and Rinoa.

"Quistis," Squall yelled, and she spun around -

And then Rinoa's spell hit her, some strange combination of a Float spell and a Gravity spell, and she felt herself flying upwards, her only thought _Hyne, I hope Rinoa is controlling this one._

They were pulled up into the cargo bay, and Quistis could actually feel the point in which Rinoa's spell faded and the pull of the Ragnarok took over. The three of them landed very ungracefully on the floor and slid across the room. She heard Squall bark a command, most likely into his wrist communicator, as she remained, half-dazed and counting her limbs. Once she was sure they were all there she rolled over.

Squall was shouting into his wrist (a mildly amusing image), "No, close the door, we're in!", while Rinoa, now directionless, was floating off towards the still gaping opening at the end of the chamber.

"Squall!" Quistis yelled, and together the two of them leapt to their feet and grabbed Rinoa's arms.All Quistis could remember of the point where she touched Rinoa was a blinding, consuming static mixed with large amounts of panic; close to that which she had felt in her cell, only magnified. She almost dropped the girl's arm in shock, but gritted her teeth. Rinoa was surprisingly forceful, almost heavy, for someone floating in midair.

But then in another instant Rinoa collapsed onto the ground (and partially onto Squall and Quistis, as the Sorceress had crumpled in their direction). The glow around her faded and now it was just Rinoa, quiet, silent.

Quistis met Squall's eyes over the unconscious body of his lover. Wordlessly, Squall hoisted himself to his feet and picked Rinoa up in his arms.

Quistis followed them into one of Ragnarok's smaller rooms, where Squall gently lay Rinoa down on a cot. Someone had turned the room into an imitation of the SeeD car on the train - Quistis suspected young miss Tilmitt - and she and Squall both collapsed onto nearby couches.

His wrist buzzed. "Yes, Nida, we're in," Squall said patiently. "Balamb."

He was sitting, trying to look at ease, but every few seconds his eyes were drawn towards Rinoa's still form. Quistis was surprised that he wasn't over near her, but she guessed that Squall was trying to be respectful and dignified and manly. He wasn't panicking, which meant (probably) that something like this had happened before and that Rinoa would be fine; no, it was just normal, everyday Squall Leonhart _worrying without looking attached._

Quistis sighed. The incredulity of her situation was beginning to sink in. She was safe - she was going home. And she'd been saved by Squall and Rinoa, which would require some proficient grace and a tall helping of humble pie.

She looked up at Squall to ask him something - anything - but his eyes were on Rinoa again, and she simply said: "Will she be alright?"

Squall turned his eyes down onto his hands. "Yeah, I think so."

At least Quistis was familiar with this game. She prompted him with a question: "What happened?"

"Some kind of reaction." He glanced over, and then sat up straight and looked at Quistis. "Something happened when she walked through the Elsevier sensors."

"Hm," Quistis said. "The magic dampers?"

"Maybe," Squall said. "Didn't feel like that, though."

A slight pause, and then Quistis asked, "What did it - ah - feel like, then?"

Squall realized the intimacy of his words; his eyes flared with brief anger at Quistis's inadvertent teasing. Luckily, he answered. "It was like they were going after her, but she was too much for them to take." He paused, thinking, and gave Rinoa a long, clear look before finishing. "She overloaded something, though, some kind of circuit."

"Yeah, I felt that," Quistis said, identifying the whine and shudder she had experienced. "My GFs came back after that - well, kind of - and so I bet she did overload the magic dampers, somehow."

Squall shook his head, still looking at Rinoa. He was like this: not close-mouthed, necessarily, if you were willing to wring it out of him. However, you sure did have to wring. Quistis was used to it. And Squall was, at least, trying.

"So what happened before?" she asked, curious. "Why - how did you guys know to come? I was trying to find a way to get in touch with you, but I couldn't get anywhere."

"We had two signs," Squall said. Quistis looked at him inquisitively.

"First," he said, his deep voice pitched low (probably for the pseudo-sleeping Rinoa), "we had a visit from Headmaster Shain, who came to town for Selphie's benefit banquet."

Quistis knew what was coming; Squall, to his credit, only smirked as he said, "Shain says he had all of your bags and was very concerned as to why you hadn't come back for a change of clothing."

She shook her head. "I couldn't exactly carry them around Esthar, could I, now?"

"He was worried," Squall said. It was enough to make her smile, strangely; Shain, worried over her. "So we were running up your last couple transmissions and reports to see if we could figure you out."

"And?" She drummed her fingers on the seat. "The second piece?"

Squall was staring: not at Rinoa, but off in the distance. His eyes were full of a muted anger. "There was this email," he said.

His voice was so angry and upset that Quistis got a strange feeling in the pit of her stomach. "What kind of email?"

He shook his head slightly. "It almost got deleted," he said. "Spam filter. It just had this one line..."

His eyes flicked over to Rinoa then, and Quistis softly said, "And?"

Squall looked up then to meet her gaze with his own steely one. "One line. 'Sorceress Rinoa Heartilly for Instructor Quistis Trepe.' And an address."

"_What?_" Quistis's fists slammed into the couch beside her. "Oh, gods. This is all my fault. Squall -"

"Hey," Squall said, forcefully, almost angrily. "I didn't mean for her to come, okay? My plan was to dispatch the Special-Ops, delete the email, and get you back home in time for tea."

She couldn't quite explain the feeling of guilt. "But what happened?"

Squall looked down at his hands again, and a rueful smile flickered across his face. "She was reading over my shoulder," he admitted, and Quistis had to laugh.

"But," he continued, still looking at his hands. "She - she, uh, thought she owed you one. There was a kidnapping attempt on her, one of the weekends she went to see Caraway. And because of your warning she'd - asked her father to set up an extra guard."

"Oh." Quistis was silent. This didn't really help the feeling of guilt; it was still her fault that Rinoa had been dragged into all this.

"She was about to run off on her own on some miraculous rescue adventure." Squall was rubbing his hands over his face now, clearly tired and worried. "And so we compromised - she could be part of the rescue if she didn't run off and do something stupid."

"You staged a switch," Quistis said, understanding now. "Brought her in, as if you were going to make the trade." Squall nodded in confirmation. "Huh," she continued. "I bet it caught them off-guard that you had agreed to the deal."

"The original plan was to distract them while the Special-Ops slipped in the back," Squall said. "But then we went through the front gate..."

"And the fireworks went off," Quistis said, motioning to Rinoa.

Squall nodded. "We've been - training," he said, not wanting to divulge any more details. "I've been - I can help her control it." His voice, usually strong, was strangely hesitant.

"I saw," Quistis said. "You guys made an amazing team."

The gratitude in her voice was honestly meant, and the sting she'd felt at being the rescued, not the rescuer, faded away.

It was her turn to talk. "Squall," she began, "we need to call a Balamb council meeting. Garden Council, maybe, but I don't want this information to get too far. We should do it tonight, really, or first thing tomorrow-"

"Fat chance," said a very weak voice. "Tomorrow's Selphie's banquet, and there's no meeting that'll let you get out of it."

Rinoa was hauling herself upright on the cot; Squall, moving faster than battle, was at her side, his arm supporting her back as she sat up.

"Oog," Rinoa said intelligently. "I feel like I've been dragged backwards through D-City." Her voice was weak, but full of humour; she leant her head on Squall's shoulder. "You okay, Quistis?"

The blonde nodded crisply, and smiled. " Sure thing. Thanks. You okay, Rinoa?"

Rinoa smiled sleepily back at her. "I think so. _Ugh._ All my muscles are filled with - whatever, the after-ness of magic, what's that called?"

"Aftermath, or Residue," Quistis said automatically. "Yeah, you'll be stiff for a while."

"Don't I know it," Rinoa said, but coming from the girl it wasn't a correction or criticism; just a comment. "It'll be okay, though. Dr Kadowaki says my system metabolizes magical stuff about ten times faster than the average SeeD." She giggled softly. "One of the - few - perks to being a Sorceress."

Quistis wondered that, after the fascinatingly devastating operation she had just seen, Rinoa could make jokes. Perhaps the girl deserved a little more credit than she was normally given.

They reached Balamb shortly after; Squall helped Rinoa out of the Ragnarok while Quistis was greeted by Pilot Nida and three SeeD she recognized from Special-Ops. The sight of Balamb Garden, all glowing rings and pride, was the final realization: she was _home_. The adrenaline and stress in her muscles was beginning to fade, and exhaustion and aftershock was beginning to creep in. Quistis knew she needed a nap, and a shower; and soon. The tiredness was hitting her like a T-Rexaur.

"Wait." Squall reached out, turned her around; he scrambled around in the battle-pack for a while before pulling something out and zipping it back up. "Here," he said. It was a Balamb ID, marked for temporary access. "Do you still have yours?"

"Everything's gone," she replied, wistfully thinking of Save the Queen.

"Bed," Squall said to her, his arm still around Rinoa as he helped the tired Sorceress along. "That's an order. You can get checked out by Kadowaki tomorrow."

He didn't have to tell Quistis twice. They split up; Squall walking Rinoa down towards the cafeteria, Quistis heading directly for her dormitory. Luckily she passed no-one in the halls. She wasn't quite in the mood for Selphie at the moment, or even Xu.

The door opened and closed behind her with a sound of finality. Quistis looked around her room with extreme pleasure. Talk about a sight for sore eyes. And a sore back. And a very sore mind.

Within approximately thirty-seven seconds all of Quistis Trepe's clothing lay in a neat pile on the bed, the coffee-pot was gurgling, and Quistis herself was in the midst of taking the hottest shower in the history of Balamb Garden.

She washed her hair three times, her face twice, and used half a bottle of conditioner and an entire travel-sized bottle of shower gel. After that she just stood in the shower, letting the scalding water beat away at the stiffness in her shoulders and back, letting heat and comfort and relief seep into her tired body.

There was so much to _do_. She had to gather up evidence to present. Try to talk Squall into having his meeting tomorrow instead of the next day. Get cleared by Kadowaki. Head back to the Training Center, not only to beat her muscles back into shape but to learn the quirks of the Medusa's Ire. Figure out Seifer. Get her bags back from Shain. But that was all outside of her shower, and she didn't want to move.

A fine example of one of those times where so much weighs on the mind that the mind says simply, _screw this_, and dumps it all on the floor.

Eventually, Quistis emerged from her bathroom, skin bright pink and burning. She wrapped herself in an assortment of butter-yellow towels and a creamy fleece bathrobe, relishing in being able to wear something that _wasn't_ her battle-gear. The room smelled of fresh coffee, delicious and familiar.

She fell backwards onto the bed, towels and robe askew, submerging herself in the safety of her own room and the smell of coffee and the feeling of warmth.

Within thirty-two seconds, Quistis Trepe was asleep.

-

_haha, sorry about the long delay. i mean, it was already long, but the chapter was ready to be up last week and my account got suspended. (blush) they took away my script fic. guess those got illegal when i wasn't looking. oh well, many apologies, didn't mean any harm. and now i'm back!   
_

_Mirrorfeather has grown wings, a tail, and two more movements: your comments appreciated. Shameless, am I._

_Man, I owe lots and lots of thank-yous. From Ch11 onward:_

**_Sarady_**_ - (11) A lot of people liked the GFs - I'm glad, cause I'm having fun with them. (12) I think poor Quistis is very confused._

**_Shortey_**_ - (11) thank you, so much. (As for the pairing ... um ...well if you really want to ask, feel free to email me :P ) (12) HAHAHA. Yes, surprisingly, I am a LOT like Quistis, enough that it's strange (blond girl with glasses who has always been a little too 'mature/old' and ends up being everyone's teacher. It's uncanny). And Seifer will be back in ... umm ... if not the next chapter, then the one directly after. He still has a part to play... ;)_

**_Enkida_**_ - muuuuuchos gracias for the review-spam - what a great compliment! Maybe I should just write you an email, there's too much in your comments for me to comment on/respond to! It would take a whole page. Anyway, THANKS!_

**_Melete_**_ - I try to throw in little details to make this my own little world. (And yes, I confess: Seifer is innocent. Or as innocent as he can be. Which really isn't. But I haven't done anything to him!)_

**_Pierson_**_ - Hi! And thank you_

**_chococat2_**_ - (11)I'm just discovering the evil of cliff-hangers ...I hate them ...but I can't help myself... (12) aie, such a compliment! If you like this style you should try reading Robin McKinley - she is my goddess and I try to model her as much as humanly possible without plagarizing her work ;)_

**_Nynaeve77_**_ - (11) Hi to you! Hopefully I'll get around to filling in that dream sequence; I liked making Quistis go clubbing, it seems like her idea of hell, honestly. (12) Someone bench-pressed ME once, it wasn't very pleasant. And I like introspective Quistis because, as you said, I think it scares her a lot._

**_Noacat_**_ - (11) tee ...it's so nice to have loyal supporters! (12) And yeah, my cat is just so nosy. If only I could teach her to type then she could update for me, but alas. I just didn't want to lose the introspect angle like (i feel) i did in SC._

**_Thugstra_**_ - the dream-scene was part fun and part meaningful, so don't explode that brain just yet :P_

**_Dominus_**_ - (11)a couple people didn't like Era ...hmmm ...am I too obvious? ;) (12) thank you :)_

**_CWolf2_**_ - (11) I'm trying to keep you in suspense. (12) Wow, I'm honored. But a lot of those other stories are crap, aren't they? ;);)_

**_Rachel1_**_ - I loved reading your reviews as you went through the story, it was really cool to see ... (12) Hopefully this chapter had enough action!_

**_Peachy Papayas_**_ - So many people like Shain, I'm so glad. And you and Rachel caught my mistake. Again: this is why seventhe should not write at the wee hours in the morn..._

**_GhandiOwnsYou_**_ - Haha, thank you! I love Xahra's fics, she's so brilliantly sarcastic. I'm glad I got you "hooked". Hope you'll stick around til the end!_

**_Xan318_**_ - Thank you, I am shameless and love all compliments_

**_Apple Pie_**_ - Wow, it's nice to see you around again. :) I like playing with introspective, especially with characters that aren't mine._

-

_Until next time, which will hopefully come much more quickly. I'm kind of getting my groove back with this one. MF was a pleasant distraction. Let's see if I can wrap this baby up..._

_Pura vida,_

_seventhe and rydia, the kitty cat of dooooooooooom_


	14. The Gravity of Conversation

_AN at the bottom._

--

**Chapter Fourteen**

The Gravity of Conversation

_Thud, thud, thud. Thud._

A very groggy Quistis stood up and stretched. She was not yet sure where she was, why she was so comfortable, and/or why there was a strange thumping sound piercing her brain. All of her morning rituals seemed as far away as the moon. She looked down.

She was wearing a creamy soft bathrobe (currently not-wrapped around her in a quite inappropriately revealing manner) and was surrounded by the remains of a yellow towel army. Little heaps and puddles of soft butter-yellow towel peeked out at her amidst the mess she had made of her bed. She tied the bathrobe properly, ignored the towels, and went for the door.

Rinoa was standing there, pounding on the door with a look of amusement on her face. She lowered her hand as the door opened. "I thought I'd be knocking for days," she said, giggling at the sight of Quistis in her bathrobe.

"Good morning," Quistis replied, not knowing what to do other than be proper and polite.

Rinoa smiled. "Squall wants me to tell you that there will be a short debriefing meeting this morning, and a full Garden Council hearing based on your findings tomorrow, if you want."

"What time is the debriefing?" Quistis asked.

"Whenever you wake up," Rinoa said with a wicked grin. "We thought you were going to sleep forever. Squall and I made a bet, actually," she continued conversationally. "He said that you'd be up at 6 AM because it was programmed into your brain and you couldn't operate any other way. And _I_ said you'd sleep for a really long time because you'd just been in jail and were really off schedule."

Quistis, amused, leant her weight against the doorframe and asked, "Who wins?"

"I dunno," Rinoa said, chewing her lip. "Not Squall, certainly, cause it's almost 10, but I'm not sure if it counts as a long time, so I don't know if I win either." She flashed Quistis a girlish grin. "It doesn't matter, the bet was mostly dinner, so either way I win."

"Mostly dinner?"

Rinoa's grin turned decidedly, if cheerfully, evil. "Dinner and a little prize," she said. "Regarding Selphie's masquerade."

"Oh," Quistis said miserably. "I don't suppose I'll be able to escape that."

"Probably not," Rinoa said, looking down at the floor. "Actually, um..."

Quistis tilted her head. "What's wrong, Rinoa?"

The girl's posture - her hands clasped behind her, face towards the ground, shoulders swinging slowly - was suddenly deferential, submissive.

"Well," Rinoa began, very hesitantly. "I was wondering if I could, uh, help you get ready for the banquet and all," she said shyly. "I always like getting ready with other girls, see, and Selphie will be so busy all day, and plus I figured you wouldn't have anything to wear since you just got back from, uh, jail, and you might need some help..."

Quistis paused for a moment - _oh god, girl talk, getting ready and makeup and oh, the horror_ - but then she realized: _I need to talk to Rinoa anyway, I should be nice, and she's right - I don't have anything to wear._

She gave Rinoa a real, genuine smile and said lightly, "I'd love that."

Rinoa grinned at her. "I was hoping," she said, all in a rush. "I mean, you're the other girl, and I know you're not all that girly, but I like girls - well, I like guys too, but anyway - really, I'd like to hang out with you once in a while. Plus I have some really awesome ideas for your costume."

Quistis wondered whether Squall's lost bet had anything to do with Rinoa's "awesome ideas," but she bit her tongue and said simply, "I'm glad."

"I mean, we wouldn't want you to look horrible for your first banquet back," Rinoa said, teasing lightly but also slightly serious.

"Well," said Quistis, "I could always go as a SeeD Instructor."

"Ah!" Rinoa cried in mock horror. "Perish the thought!" And she and Quistis started laughing.

"Anyway," Rinoa said, once she'd caught her breath, "I'm to escort you to Squall's office once you're ready. Then I think you have to get the Kadowaki once-over - ew! - and then I'm assuming you'll be getting ready for the meeting tomorrow, so I'll come find you here?"

Quistis nodded. "Alright, tell Squall I'll be up."

"Actually," Rinoa said, looking a little hesitant, "Squall said I have to escort you. There's some rule-y thing." She shrugged.

"Oh, right," Quistis said, nodding her head in realization.

Rinoa quirked her head. "What's it mean?"

"Oh," Quistis smiled. "I'm still an _active target_ and cannot go anywhere unescorted until my report has been made."

The shorter girl made a face. "Ew, really?"

"Part of the _Prisoner-Of-War Amendment, Part II_," Quistis quoted, shaking her head. "I don't believe I forgot about that."

Rinoa grinned and stood up in a mock salute. "I'll guard the door, ma'am! You just throw on your uniform, or whatever, and then we'll mosey on up to the Commander's office!"

Quistis genuinely laughed. (Although one did not just _throw_ on a SeeD uniform; a SeeD uniform was earned, and one _put it on_ as one would proudly wear a medal. Rinoa, however, was not a SeeD, and so Quistis kindly forgave her and went inside to change.)

Quistis was 'escorted' to the Commander's office and dropped off with the same silly salute. Inside, she found a busy, focused-looking Squall working through some papers, and a slightly-amused Xu working through a crossword puzzle.

"Quistis," Squall greeted, with a nod towards an empty chair. Xu immediately stood and left; Quistis shot Squall a questioning glance which was answered as Xu quickly returned with a fresh cup of coffee. The mug was bright red and read **_Who's your daddy?_ **in bold white letters. Quistis shot it another questioning glance.

"From Rinoa," Squall said. "She thought it was funny."

Quistis laughed and sipped at the coffee, smiling at Xu gratefully. "It's almost a Laguna joke, Squall."

Squall briefly rolled his eyes. "I'm sure he'd think it was hilarious," he said, deadpan. "Anyway. Let's have a quick debriefing so that I know what to prepare for tomorrow's beatdown."

Quistis smiled into her cup. She admired Squall's sharp ability to change a subject away from anything regarding Laguna, Rinoa, or the two of them having the same stupid sense of humour.

"Mission details, and then timeline," Xu suggested as she lowered herself behind her prized laptop, volunteering herself to act as the briefing stenographer. Her fingers began to blur over the keys as she tapped. "Trepe, acting mission ID..." her voice trailed off as she entered the appropriate details. Quistis knew that the voice recorder on the laptop was also running, but Xu never missed a detail.

"Right," Squall said, his voice becoming serious. "For the record, this is Balamb Garden Commander Leonhart, debriefing Special Investigator Quistis Trepe. Trepe, your mission entailed investigation and resolution of the situation revealed by the Kinneas-Tilmitt mission last month: mainly, the investigation of traitorous entities within Garden. Please summarize your findings at this point."

Quistis looked down into her coffee. "As stated in the Kinneas-Tilmitt mission report, falsified mission documents were found - the first sign of this subterfuge. The documents were traced back to a division of a scientific organization called Elsevier. Elsevier is a widely-known scientific research organization, but the branch of neomagic and Source magic research has recently split off from the main administration."

She took a sip. "This branch of the organization is housed in Argun, Esthar. They are fiercely interested in secretly recruiting SeeD, but as far as evidence goes have shown no interest in legal hiring. Their research involves pro-Sorceress political groups - ones who want to harness Source Power for global use."

Quistis paused, took another sip to gather her thoughts. Squall was watching expectantly, taking notes on a clipboard; Xu's fingers had been hitting in tandem with her words and paused as she paused; the absence of tapping filled the room.

"This branch of Elsevier is linked closely with Galbadia Garden," she said, and watched as Squall's eyes flew up from his page to her face. "Initially, emails were tracked between the two organizations through Galbadia's computer network. I then followed the leads and investigated further. The operation is receiving funding from Galbadia, marked with Garden Certified Code linking it to Galbadia, and authorized by Martine's GCC access code. Era Maxus, Commander of G.-Garden, appears to be one of the main contacts with this organization. At the point of this discovery my investigation was halted by my imprisonment."

Squall jotted a few brief words down, and then began: "And this imprisonment ...?"

"Yes," Quistis confirmed, "I was taken captive while in Galbadia Garden itself, by Commander Maxus himself, so I can verify his involvement."

Squall had stopped writing. He opened his mouth with a question, but Quistis said very softly, "There is one more thing that might be pertinent to current Garden operation." She paused, watching Squall's eyes flick down to his page and then back to her face. "Elsevier's files state very clearly that they are framing Seifer Almasy, former Balamb Garden student."

Even Xu's head snapped up at this one in surprise. Quistis took a hasty sip of coffee and continued, "They have set him up to appear as the leader of this Elsevier organization. Rumours abound in Argun about the leader, known as Grey, whose physical characteristics and temperament fit Cadet Almasy. However, I found documentation outlining the plan to spread these rumours and frame Almasy as Grey in Elsevier's files: to the point of keeping Cadet Almasy a prisoner in the city of Argun."

There was an extended pause, and then Squall sank slowly back into his chair and said very clearly, "Well, shit."

"On or off the record, Commander?" Xu murmured.

"Oh. Urgh. Off the record, Xu," Squall replied vaguely with an even vaguer hand wave, his thoughts obviously elsewhere, and Quistis shot an amused glance across to Xu. The stenographer did not return it.

"That's ... news," Xu began. "Are you sure you...?"

"Am I sure what?" Quistis asked.

Squall was currently rubbing his eyebrows, pinching the bridge of his nose in confusion. "Are you sure you didn't get it backwards, Quistis. That Seifer Almasy is behind this branch of Elsevier and he is framing Era Maxus."

Quistis bristled. "I am quite sure, Commander," she retorted. "Although I have no concrete proof at this time, with a proper GCC warrant we can seize documents from Elsevier which will prove that Cadet Almasy is the target of -"

"Okay, Quistis," Squall said, raising his hand to her, the other splaying itself across his eyes. "I believe you. But no one else will. You realize that, right?"

Xu's voice floated up from the back of the room. "Shall I insert a stop in the recorder? Or should we move on to the timeline?"

Squall shook his head briefly, as if to settle the thoughts better, and then nodded. "Continue. Timeline, Trepe."

She stopped abruptly, trying to hide her discomfort by gulping the remains of her coffee and making a full-mouthed gesture to the alcove where Xu kept the coffee-pot. Squall looked at her quizzically but nodded, and Xu inserted a pause into the tape recorder. She felt a momentary flash of very unprofessional panic. What in Hyne's Green Heaven was she going to say about meeting Almasy?

Lie? Or tell the truth? Her mind whirred as she slowly poured fresh coffee into the glaringly bright red cup. She could simply say she'd been knocked out in the apartment complex, and woken up in Trabia: no harm done, and Seifer would be left alone. But then there'd be a lie on her perfect record, and if that came out, all hell would break loose for her _and_ Almasy _and_ Shain and _everyone_. However, if she confessed, she'd have to stop Squall (and, much more likely: Xu) from sending out the SeeD Special Ops team to drag Almasy in. Yes, she'd given them a _city_, but that was much different than saying _Yes I saw Almasy and worst of all, I didn't get him. He got me._

Plus, she'd have to admit that Raijin had taken her down.

Quistis bowed her head over the cup as it dawned on her: she'd made her choice the second she'd opened up to Headmaster Shain - no, to Shain Sheridan, who had been her friend and confidant, the one she had gone to for advice. If she'd been able to say it to Shain, she should be able to say it to Squall and Xu, the two people who quite possibly knew her better than anyone on the planet, although neither would have admitted to it.

And then she'd have to go to Shain and ask him to forget what she had said, ask him to help her cover a lie: and it was this fact, this imagined conversation, that settled the guilt directly into her stomach.

So Quistis sat down, sighed, and laid out her mission in blunt, bleak detail.

--

She'd been in debrief all day long, it seemed; together, the three officers had defeated an entire pad of paper and two point five pots of coffee. Quistis had come up with a giant decision tree tracking each branch of her investigation, the information she had received, and how it all related back to Elsevier and/or Grey.

Her mind was exhausted. Its tiny wheels had been turning all day long; she needed to recharge her batteries.

Xu had then walked her to Doctor Kadowaki's office. The verbal debrief was, in many ways, the easy part; Kadowaki's medical and physical debriefings were _intense_. They were viewed as highly necessary - the possibility of a SeeD coming back from captivity with, say, a rogue GF implanted in her brain was dangerous enough to chill even stoic Squall - but the necessity was not enough to make the experience charming.

Kadowaki, luckily, was as close to an old friend of Quistis's as Xu was, and so the process of blood draws, sensitivity scans, magical histories, and muscle examinations wasn't quite as painful as it could have been. But it was still exhausting. Quistis trudged up to her dorm room with Rinoa (who had come to 'escort' her and was clearly worrying her bottom lip over having enough time to get ready for Selphie's benefit dance) and begged the girl for an hour or two of respite.

The nap was amazing.

And, right on time, there was a pounding on her door.

Rinoa came in, hauling what looked to be a suitcase behind her. Quistis's eyes widened at the sight of it and Rinoa laughed charmingly at her, saying, "Well, I had a couple ideas, so I brought everything I could think of. And I ran into Selphie, and she gave me an awesome idea. And I haven't looked through your stuff yet!"

The small brunette tucked the case-on-wheels next to Quistis's bed and hauled herself into the bedroom, where Quistis heard her making short work of the immaculately organized closet. The instructor tentatively took a step towards Rinoa's case, somewhat irrationally afraid that the thing would swallow her whole.

There was a very girly squeal - high enough to summon Angelo, Quistis feared - and then Rinoa threw herself back around the corner with her arms full of something shimmery and blue and said, "Quistis, where on earth did you get this?"

Quistis focused her gaze on Rinoa's armful as the girl shook it out: it was a dark blue dress, shimmery, with tiny sparkles on it. "No idea, Rinoa. Do you want it?"

"I'm already dressed, Quisty. It's for you," Rinoa said, smiling wickedly. "Here, put it on. I think I've got something."

Quistis stepped modestly into her bedroom and tugged the sleek dress on over her head. By the time she emerged, Rinoa had created what looked like a battlefield of cosmetics and accessories across the bedspread.

"So here's the plan," Rinoa said, looking at Quistis with a particularly mischievous look. "You know how Zell and the other students always joked around, called you the Ice Queen? Back when you were an Instructor and before you were, like, people's friends? Well, we're going to dress you up as Shiva, and make you a real Ice Queen, what do you think? Selphie thought of it!"

Quistis looked at the gleam in Rinoa's eyes and gave up all hope of retaining her dignity. _Before you were, like, people's friends? _Ouch

"Look, Rinoa," she said, as the girl settled her down into a chair and grabbed an entire handful of select cosmetic products, "I need to ask you a question - something serious."

"I'm not spilling the beans on me and Squall," Rinoa replied cheerily in a sing-song voice. "Nice try, though."

"No - um, no," Quistis said hastily. _Gods, no._ "It's about Seifer."

She felt Rinoa's hand freeze against her face; convinced that the application of paint supplies had stopped for a moment, Quistis tilted her head upwards.

Rinoa was very deliberately not meeting her eyes.

"Is something wrong?"

Rinoa, her eyes still trained on the floor, gave a very noncommittal and utterly unconvincing shrug.

Quistis sighed. "Rinoa, I do have questions for you, but ... I think you should tell me whatever it is you don't want to say, first," she said, and then Rinoa did meet her eyes, and guiltily.

"I - I can't," the girl replied, awkwardly.

Quistis looked to the floor for a minute, gathering her thoughts - _what's the best way to phrase this?_ - and then looked back up, reaching up to grasp Rinoa's free hand. "Look, Rin," she said, trying to sound as much like Rinoa's _friend_ as possible, "I've come across some stuff about him on my mission. I can't tell you what it's about. But I can tell you that one of the things I need to know is _your_ character judgement on Seifer. And look - I'm not supposed to even be talking about this, so we'll keep each other's secrets, okay?"

The young sorceress crouched down, until her head was lower than Quistis's; she then looked upwards, troubled brown eyes focusing on blue.

"Look, he came to see me," she said softly, actually looking over her shoulder to make sure no one else was in the room. "Seifer did. I was visiting Cara- my father," she corrected hastily. "The summer we were ... he used to sneak in ... just to talk. And I woke up one night and he was ... there."

Quistis's eyes narrowed. "What did he do? Why haven't you told anyone?"

Rinoa shook her head. "He just wanted to ... to talk. To make sure I was okay. To hear that everyone else was okay. To know that Edea had ... that Matron was ... okay. He doesn't even remember a lot of the stuff, and when he did, he ... wanted to check. He was ... nice," she said, the bland word speaking volumes in her soft tone.

She looked down at the sponge (_Sponge?_ A small part of Quistis's mind noted in alarm) and then looked back up. "He said he was sorry," she said, with a small quirky smile that was all too sad on her face.

Quistis shook her head. "And then, two days later, you were almost kidnapped."

Rinoa nodded; having regained some of her spirits, she went back to lightly dabbing Quistis's face. "When he showed up, it reminded me of your warning, so I had Carawa- my father post guards."

Quistis let her eyes close momentarily in thought. Another paradox. Either Seifer had deliberately led Elsevier to Rinoa, or they had followed him unknowingly. Innocent or guilty? And how had he left the city anyway?

"Rinoa," she found herself asking, choosing her words carefully, "did Seifer seem - angry? Vengeful? Irrational, anything?"

She felt hair flicking against her arm in a way that told her Rinoa was shaking her head. "You know Seifer, he's always angry about something," Rinoa said thoughtfully. "But he seemed more - _hurt_." Again, the simple word had levels of meaning. "Something got pulled out of him during the whole ... thingey ... and I think he's just trying to pull himself back together."

"You don't think he'd actively do something against us, do you?" Quistis opened her eyes to see Rinoa coming in with some strange makeup tool that looked like a projectile weapon; she closed her eyes again. "Us in this case meaning SeeD, meaning Balamb Garden. I mean, I only knew him as a student, so..."

"No," Rinoa said, and she was so confident that Quistis flicked her eyes open to meet her gaze.

"Look," Rinoa said shyly, "it's like another ... Sorceress thing. Like when you were trying to explain what a Sensor was to me? It's like that, but with ... feelings, like, or truth, or something. Especially cause Seifer was ... one of ... our Knights."

Quistis couldn't help but shiver at the use of _our_ and wonder what, in the dark of the night, Rinoa had to face alone.

The girl shook her head, pulling a smile back onto her face. "But no," she said. "You can kind of - feel it, I guess. He's not out to get anyone. If it had been five years, maybe, just cause he's so angry. But right now? Seifer's still in pieces."

Quistis filed this away under _Information that will Not Hold Up in Court but is Good to Have Anyway. _"Have you ever - have you ever seen him lie?"

Rinoa giggled. "Absolutely not," she said. "He wouldn't even lie when I wanted him to, when we were ... yeah. Not even then."

Quistis found herself relaxing. Rinoa's soft touch, as strange as it was, was kind of soothing. Quistis made a mental note to look into spas in the future as a SeeD relaxation technique.

Eventually Rinoa finished; the girl bound Quistis's hair high on her head in a Shiva-like ponytail, then began doing something almost massage-like which turned out to be (to Quistis's utter horror, once her eyes were open) dying streaks of her blonde hair a bright blue. Rinoa laughed and told her it was quite washable and she should lighten up for once.

Finally done, they stood in front of the mirror. Quistis looked over at Rinoa as the girl fastened on her little halo and wings: _angel_, obviously. Her own outfit - blue dress and high gloves and icy tinted lips and hair - had actually turned out looking much like the ice goddess herself might have looked, and Quistis smiled involuntarily.

She felt Shiva stir in her mind, having heard her name, and Quistis wondered if the GF could look into the mirror and see what she could see. Surprisingly, she felt Shiva's consciousness became a little more pronounced, inducing a slightly hazy, static-y feeling; unbalanced, one hand flew out to grasp the edge of her bathroom counter, and Quistis took a sharp breath.

Rinoa gasped beside her, and Quistis turned (dizzily) to the young Sorceress, whose eyes had opened wide.

A look of disbelief spread on Rinoa's face. "She - she's laughing at you," the girl said, her mouth slowly spreading into an amused smile.

Quistis turned back into the mirror, staring deliberately at the reflection, feeling Shiva rear up inside of her, almost like a Summon, one she could not quench -

_Ice Queen._

The words were obviously aimed directly for her ears (or, more accurately, her inner ear) and move obviously tinged with humour. Quistis watched, astounded, as the air around her neck began to shimmer, and a delicate line of ice crystals formed like the strangest frost above her collarbone: an organic necklace.

"Wow," Rinoa said, reaching out and almost-touching it. "I can ... feel the spell," she whispered. "It's beautiful, Quistis."

Quistis was still a little nonplussed at having had (as far as she knew) the first _ever_ pseudo-conversation with a Guardian Force that did not involve a Sorceress, a Sensor, or Source Magic of any kind. But then again, she and Shiva _did_ have a special kind of bond, and it had certainly saved her life many times, not to mention the science-defying feats she had witnessed in Argun. She'd take whatever friendships she could get, she decided. As the ice summon faded back town to a slight tingle in the back of her mind, Quistis smiled into the mirror and watched as her icy blued lips smiled back.

* * *

_Begin long author's note._

_I know I haven't touched this in a long time. Here's a brief list of why: (1) dad had cancer (2) senior project (3) dad had surgery (4) finals (5) graduation (6) moving (7) new job (8) adjusting and taking the hell out of a break i sorely needed._

_I do have plans to finish SLG, but it's mostly because (a) i have the end planned out and (b) i hate unfinished fic. Frankly I've lost interest in this sort of writing. I started this to teach myself to write "normal" fic about "normal" people (as normal as teen!killers are. By normal I mean it didn't have total bizarre magic and unicorns in it), and I learned a lot about doing that, but frankly what I learned most is that I really like the creativity aspect. Having these dictated plot notes over here on my computer was a big step for me but it's taken a lot of the _fun_ out of things._

_I've recently begun dabbling in FF7 again. Soon I hope to dabble in FFX as well. I also hope to return to FF8, because I have what I consider to be a totally rockin' wonky plot twist, but I will need to take a break after I finish SLG. I'm not begging for reviews - it has nothing to do with the response to this story, which has been overly pleasant; it has everything to do with my (questionable) mental state and current preferences._

_So, in fin, I talk too much, and (I guess) if you ever had an inspiring (or blatantly flattering) review up your butt, now's the time to pull it out. XD_

_- sev_


	15. The Cracks in the Ice

HI!

_Beware: Long Author's Note at the end._

_--_-

**Chapter Fifteen**

_The Cracks in the Ice_

Quistis fidgeted.

She couldn't help herself. Not so long ago she'd been stuck in a prison with only dog-shaped mold to talk to; then there had been the dramatic rescue, and the more-dramatic debriefing. (Yes, Quistis thought idly, I am probably the one person in existence who could find a debriefing dramatic). The results of her conversation with Rinoa were pinging through her head as the mechanical part of her brain tried to fit them all together. There was too much going on, she was high on exhaustion and glory, and - she, through no fault of her own, was dressed like a damn Guardian Force.

So she stood at the sidelines of the ballroom and fidgeted. She smoothed the shimmers of the long blue dress she wore. She plucked and tugged at the elbow-high formal gloves. She even twirled the blue-streaked locks of her hair which fell over her shoulder (she had been _livid_ when she caught Rinoa using the hair dye, but it was already too late, and Rinoa swore on Squall's job that it would wash out that evening). Her long fingers, trapped inside the pale gloves, trailed along the beads and gems of the jewelry draped about her neck, brushing lightly the ice necklace given to her by the GF she was currently posing as.

She felt _stupid._

At the beginning of the festival, she'd amused herself (and made herself feel slightly less awkward) by watching the others. Rinoa had come, of course, as an angel; but to Quistis's surprise, the girl had (somehow) gotten Squall to come as her counterpart, wearing all black with a tiny pair of bright red devil's horns perched atop his head. Selphie was a golden butterfly, wings stretching all the way to the floor; Irvine had simply paired a bandana with his usual outfit and come as a bandit. Zell was having exorbitant amounts of fun with his vampire costume - complete with cape, hat, and plastic fangs which he used to bite/drool all over his date, Ambrosia, who was dressed as a princess but kept whacking Zell with her crown.

The benefit was actually quite nice, as Garden dances go; most of Trabia Garden seemed to be in attendance, as well as certain large-business heads Quistis recognized. The ticket price had been on the high end, as was the point of a benefit banquet, but most of BG had turned out in support.

The lights were twinkling, the music playing, and Quistis Trepe fidgeted.

Eventually she came to the realization that standing by herself and being nervous would only make the night drag on, so Quistis headed over to Headmaster Cid, standing beside Edea. Neither had chosen to masquerade; Cid wore a simple tux, Edea a long dress the color of indigo. Both looked pleased to see her (though she was sure Cid had already been informed of her rescue and subsequent return). Cid glowed with the pride of a Headmaster, and Edea shone with her simple grace.

"Quistis," Cid said with a nod. "Welcome back. You've got perfect timing, it seems."

"It was nice of you to throw this party for me," Quistis said with a smile. "You certainly didn't have to."

Cid laughed. "It is pretty glamorous for a welcome home party," he returned jovially, "but we thought you deserved it for all your hard work."

"Are you alright, Quistis?" Edea asked softly. "I heard you were a prisoner. We've all been pretty worried about you."

Quistis nodded, feeling the blue-tipped ends of her hair flick against her bare back. "I went through Medical this morning," she replied, with a shrug. She smiled at Edea, who was eyeing her with concern. "Nothing wrong with me except for the hair," she said with a fidgety tug at the ponytail. Edea laughed.

"Excuse me," said a familiar voice. "Is this Quistis Trepe I see?"

She turned around to find Headmaster Shain standing there, with a very welcome smile on his face and looking particularly handsome in his dark tuxedo. A sudden strange feeling of nervousness swept over Quistis, and it took her a few seconds to strangle it out of her thoughts.

"Right," she said, recovering her poise, "I'm glad to see my costume is doing its job."

"I hardly recognized you," Shain said, extending his hand for a handshake, and Cid laughed.

"Ah, see, most of us here at Balamb know Instructor Trepe as our Ice Queen," he said, and Quistis groaned and dropped Shain's hand.

"How in the world do _you_ know about that?" she said, rounding on Cid.

Cid chuckled at her indignation and she felt her cheeks flush pink. "You hear a lot of strange things as Headmaster, Quistis," he said. "Students come to you with some of the oddest problems and hope that you'll be able to fix everything."

"And - and they called me - Ice Queen - to your face?" She was fighting to keep her voice from going all squeaky, all too aware of Shain's keenly amused gaze. Oh, her dignity. Because blue hair wasn't bad enough.

Cid launched himself into an imitation of a young SeeD cadet with vigor. "'Oh, Headmaster Cid, Instructor Trepe won't give me the time of day! She's like an Ice Queen! I'm afraid she'll never warm up to me ... if she'd only go out with me, only once...why won't she talk to me?'"

Shain burst out laughing, Edea chuckled softly, and Quistis groaned again and buried her red face in her gloved hands. "They did that?" she asked through silk fingers, and Cid nodded.

"More than once," he said to her. "And I had to explain to them time and time again that it was against SeeD Regs for an instructor to show more than mild friendship to any of her students."

"Oh, Hyne." Quistis shook her head to the heavens, laughing. A waiter walked by and she took the excellent opportunity to snag a glass of wine from his tray.

"It sounds like you had quite the fan club," Shain said, also selecting a glass.

She shook her head again, but this time Edea stepped in, her soft voice full of gentle laughter. "She did," the woman said. "They called themselves the Trepies, and kept track of all sorts of statistics about Quistis's rank and weapon... poor girl," she continued, directing it at Quistis, "no one had the heart to disband them."

Cid smiled. "Oh, Mr Almasy and the Disciplinary Committee used to give them detention all the time. I remember those complaints too: there would always be one detention for being out after hours, and a second one for 'being so completely asinine as to stalk Instructor Trepe'."

All three of them froze momentarily as Cid mentioned Seifer's name; Quistis recognized Edea's mild horror and Shain's shock, surprisingly. She made herself chuckle at Cid's joke, to be kind, but the mood had been ruined. The weight of her case and her debriefing tomorrow came crashing back down on her, and she sighed.

"Right, Cid," Edea said, her face smoothed over with her smile, "we should go say hello to Squall and Rinoa."

"Right," Cid agreed cheerfully, oblivious as always. "We'll talk to you later."

A sullen silence descended on Shain and Quistis. She took the opportunity to have a large sip of her wine, and then turned to Shain.

"Did you, by any chance, bring my papers?"

It was a harmless topic of conversation, and the first she could think of, and Shain broke back into a smile. "Actually, I have all of your things," he said. "They're on our boat, if you need them."

"Great," Quistis replied. "If I could pick those up before the end of the evening, that would be great."

"Tonight?" Shain looked at her. "The meeting isn't until tomorrow, right?"

"Well, you're right," she said with a shrug. "But I have a lot to put together tonight before the meeting, and it's hard to do without the notes."

Shain shrugged back, and nodded. "We can go get them whenever you'd like."

"Thanks," she said, smiling at him; he smiled back, and she felt her smile getting a little bit silly, so she looked away.

"So," she said, "it's a nice party. It should raise a lot of publicity for Trabia..."

"Why don't we get those papers now," Shain said hurriedly, downing the rest of his wine.

Surprised, Quistis looked at him. His face was serious and contemplative, not his usual joking demeanor, and she suddenly felt strange. Was something wrong? Or did he just want to get rid of her?

"Right," Quistis said, stepping back and downing the rest of _her_ wine before Shain could notice the pink flush that was creeping across her face as well. The two of them stepped out of the ballroom; Shain sent a wave at someone which, she assumed, meant _I'll be back soon_.

But then Shain turned to her and said, with a sly grin that made her realize this had been his main reason for leaving the hall in the first place, "So what the hell happened to you, Trepe?"

Hyne, she almost stumbled in her relief, and then laughed at herself for being so nervous; why was she behaving so strangely? He just wanted to pump her for information! "Do I look that bad?"

Shain snorted. "You look ridiculously good," he said, "and I mean both the ridiculous and the good. But that's not what I'm talking about. What happened to you – in Argun?"

Quistis bit back the retort on the end of her tongue which related to her costume. "Oh," she said, mostly a sigh. "Yes."

"Hey," Shain said with a shrug, "you left Trabia in a big hurry, and the next thing I know, it's been weeks and weeks, I still have your things, and Squall Leonhart's phoning me about you." He threw her another sly grin. "As the keeper of your suitcases, I think I deserve to know what happened."

"Ah," Quistis said. "Right." She took a deep breath to begin the story, but in that moment realized that they were heading out of BG. "Where are we going? The garage is that way."

Shain kept his eyes ahead, but his lips twitched with a smirk. "Our boat is in the harbor, Quistis. Can't park a boat in the garage."

She laughed. "Sorry, I'm so used to flying, I forgot not everyone has a Ragnarok."

"Rub it in, Trepe, rub it in." He looked at her now, and she returned his smile involuntarily.

"It's a walk to Balamb," she said at random, because her thoughts were jumbled by Shain's smile.

"Enough time for a story," he said, "so spill."

They walked out of Balamb Garden and into the cool night air - a welcome change for Quistis, who sighed happily. "You're incorrigible," she said, feeling a little carefree.

Shain laughed. "Think of it as a practice-run for tomorrow's debriefing," he offered.

She shook her head and fell into step beside him. "Alright. So, that first time I went to Argun, I had made up an identity for myself - just some random name, I told them I was SeeD from Trabia. That's how I got them to tell me the location of their fearless leader, and that's where I found Seifer."

"Yes," he replied, and Quistis was impressed at the lack of reaction in his voice. "I remember."

"So I went back," she continued idly; it was a little chilly, but that would soon go away with the walk. "I told them that as a good, Trabia-loving SeeD, there was no way I was joining an organization that followed Seifer Almasy. At this point, the man I was talking to left to arrange a meeting with some of the higher-ups." She shivered at the memory. "While he was gone, I Junctioned a GF into their security system to provide myself with a window."

"Wait," Shain said, his steps slowing. "You did what?"

"I Junctioned Siren into their ethereal lines," Quistis replied.

"That's crazy," Shain said, shaking his head.

"You haven't heard the craziest part," she said, laughing. "Later that night I snuck out, talked Shiva into creating an Encounter-None field – which she did – and then half-Junctioned her and used the window Siren made to slip inside Elsevier."

Shain stopped walking altogether. "Hold on," he said, a disbelieving smile on his face. "You had a GF willingly learn an ability - out of battle? Not to mention, an ability not innate to the GF's normal functioning?"

Quistis lifted her hands in the air as if to ward off the verbal attack. "I know as much as you," she replied slowly. "It just … happened. It was like … Shiva almost suggested it to me."

"Tell me," Shain said, "I'm intrigued. How, exactly, did it happen?"

She shook her head and began walking again, but Shain reached out and grabbed her arm. "Quistis, this isn't an idle question," he said, smiling at her in that way that made her feel like a close friend. "I'm really curious."

She bit her lip, remembering, ticking the events off on her fingers without even noticing. "I'd gone to a bar that had a dance floor, thinking that anyone trailing me would assume that normal behaviour for a troubled SeeD … I got on the dance floor … it was horrid, by the way … and Shiva just … I asked, and she did it." Her voice trailed off; it wasn't an explanation that would ever make Coulter's Handbook, but it was the closest she could do. Why was her tongue tied?

"Could you do it again?" Shain asked, and there was something both eager and wistful in his voice, and Quistis laughed: he sounded like a small child asking a favour.

"I'll try," she said, and reached into her sub-consciousness for Shiva. She felt silly, like a little child, dressed the way she was; but Shiva responded eagerly, as always. It was easier this time. The air began to cool; she waited for the feeling to settle, and opened her eyes, expecting to be safely within the field.

Shain's eyes, however, were still fixed on her; frowning, she closed her eyes to check her connection to Shiva.

"That's amazing," he said, and she opened her eyes again. He was walking around her in a soft, slow circle, reaching out with a hand to brush at parts of the air, and suddenly she got it.

"You're a Sensor," she said, incredulously, and Shain nodded.

"Comes in handy as a Headmaster," he said. "Sorry for making you go through all that, but I wanted to see what it looked like."

She blinked; the field wavered. "It was right," she said, not realizing she was speaking out loud until Shain shot her a quizzical look.

"I-" She started laughing, inexplicably. "I usually refrain from Junctioning and un-Junctioning too much in rapid succession, but I couldn't help it this time; I'd had to un-Junction to get past Elsevier's electronics, anyway. I had a withdrawal dream. You were in it, and you were talking in other people's voices, and Rinoa said –" She had to stop from laughing too hard. In retrospect, it _was_ hilarious. She hadn't laughed this hard in ages.

Shain was eyeing her, still testing the field. "Dreaming about me?" His lip curved in a smirk. "I'm not sure why that's so funny."

Quistis tilted her head back, looking up at the sky with a smile on her face. Shain frowned, and took a step closer. His hand reached out and grazed her neck slightly; both jumped.

"What are you -"

"What is that?" He was staring at her neck, fascinated, his fingers still tracing the icy necklace along her collarbone.

Quistis shivered, slightly, from the softness of the touch. "Shiva did it," she whispered.

"I can tell," Shain murmured, his hand now resting idly on her shoulder as he looked at it. "It's pulsing magic." He looked up at her, excitement in his eyes, not even noticing their physical closeness. "This is unbelievable. Physical manifestation of a Blizzard spell, manipulated by the GF itself."

Quistis was enthralled; this Shain was as excited and intrigued as one of her young cadets casting for the first time. "Is that -" Her words were cut off as Shain looked up at her; they both simultaneously realized how close they were, and Shain took a formal step backwards.

"It's never been done, Quistis, and I want to talk to you about this some more – these developments with Shiva are probably a breakthrough in Guardian Force compatibility studies – but for now, the rest of your story."

"Oh." Quistis turned back to the road, and they started walking again. The chill had left something like goosebumps on her arms.

"So you broke into Elsevier using a GF trick that's nearly statistically impossible," Shain said, prompting her. "So what did you find?"

"Two very important things," Quistis said, glancing around her and over her shoulder to ensure they were alone; she sidled next to the Headmaster and pitched her voice low. "This is strictly confidential," she said.

"Are you sure you should be telling me this?" Shain looked down at her, and she saw he was actually serious.

"You don't want to know?" she retorted, throwing him a smile. "Yes," she continued, "I know. But you know the rest of it – of what happened. You need to know this part as well."

Shain's mouth twitched upward. "I am the keeper of your suitcases," he reminded her lightly. "So continue."

"The first thing I found," Quistis said, her voice still low, "was cold hard evidence that Elsevier is framing Seifer Almasy. They've set him up to take the fall while they do their dirty work elsewhere, behind the scenes." She tried to keep the emotion out of her voice. "The second thing – which is the more important one – is that all of this, along with the fund dispensations allocated to keeping Seifer a veritable Argun prisoner, was on Galbadian GCC."

"Garden Code?" Shain stopped walking. Quistis paused; of course. This was a lot of information to drop on someone at once. "Garden Code?" he repeated. "From _Galbadia_?"

Quistis nodded. "All of it. Funding, SeeD reports, the Seifer mission. Galbadian GCC, from this year, to be exact."

Shain raised an eyebrow and she added hastily: "I've memorized certain familiar Garden Codes just from seeing them so often."

He chuckled unexpectedly. "I am not surprised."

He turned away, continuing the walk; they were passing through Balamb proper at this point, almost to the piers. "So Seifer is … innocent."

Quistis could hear the emotion in _his_ voice now. "I'm not going to make you say he's innocent, Shain," she said softly. "But he's not behind Elsevier. He's their _prisoner_."

Shain shook his head, as if to clear it. "So did they catch you inside the building?"

"Negative." Quistis stepped back up beside him. "I decided to head back to Galbadia and see what those GCC numbers related to. While I was there, I was apprehended by Era Maxus and taken hostage."

Shain said nothing, so she continued. "They took me back to Argun for holding. Squall Leonhart staged a fake trade-off with Rinoa Heartilly in exchange for me. It was supposed to be a distraction tactic while SeeD Ops snuck in the back door, but Rinoa's Sorceress abilities reacted strangely with the Elsevier electronics, and they ended up handling the rescue mission themselves."

"So … what?" They'd stepped on to the pier, and Shain paused, turning to look at her in the dim lighting. "We have a group dedicated to stealing the Sorceresses, after Garden from the inside? How does Maxus fit in? And why bother to frame Seifer?"

Quistis shook her head, smiling. "This is a group run by someone completely paranoid," she replied. "Everything that's been done has had its tracks covered. Seifer takes the cake." She shivered, involuntarily. "By throwing suspicion on everyone else, they've only made it worse for themselves."

Shain was looking at her funny; she raised an eyebrow at him. "Why didn't you tell me you were cold?" he asked finally, shrugging off his jacket.

"I hadn't noticed." It was true; now that she was thinking about it, the chill was glaringly obvious.

"You can't get your GF to warm you up?" Shain asked, coming behind her to wrap the coat around her shoulders. He briskly rubbed her forearms through the fabric.

Quistis smiled wryly. "I'm not sure how good Shiva would be at warming anyone up."

Suddenly, Shain had wrapped his arms around her; Quistis stiffened. "I was worried about you," he said, chuckling; she relaxed slightly. He _was_ warm. "Plus, I needed that closet space."

"Don't lie," Quistis retorted into his shirt. "You told me you didn't use it."

He rested his chin on top of her head. "Don't ruin the moment," he said lightly. "You're …you're a very special woman, Quistis, and I think I would have been quite upset if Argun had swallowed you alive."

Quistis stepped back slightly, looking up at him, her face inadvertently coloring at his words.

"I'm serious." Shain stepped back too, dropping his hands. "You don't take compliments well, do you."

Quistis winced. "Is it that obvious?"

Shain chuckled back at her. "Your face is bright red." She must have blushed even harder, because he laughed again. "Quistis. It's alright. Is it really that hard to tell someone how much you like them?"

"Shouldn't be," Quistis managed to choke out around her utter embarrassment. "Sometimes it is."

Shain shrugged, turning back to his boat. "Let me get your things," he said.

By the time he came back up, Quistis had managed to recover enough to be mortified at not offering to help with the bags – "Look at your stupid shoes," Shain said, mock-irritated. "Like you could carry anything."

"Then you can carry them all back to Garden," Quistis replied primly.

---

_Okay!_

_After a year-long hiatus, I pick this back up. I've learned a lot in the past year. Mostly that it's really fucking hard! to pick a story up after an entire year. I wonder how many of those exclamation points the stupid editor will delete. There are supposed to be four of them._

_I apologize for the delay. I do plan on finishing this story eventually. It will be slow. I will make no promises. But I do want to end it. This is mostly just a short, silly filler chapter to help me get back into things. I've gotten back into writing in the past six months – shorts mostly – but I'm doing a collab FF8 story that basically is what inspired me to launch back into this._

_So here are two things of note:_

_A lot of my writing has moved to Livejournal. You can find me on LJ as 'firstseventhe' and all of my writing under 'brokenprism'. Most of the LJ writing is shorter, drabble-y stuff that I don't feel is quite suitable for There's a lot of challenge/prompt stuff. Anyone can go: brokenprism(dot)livejournal(dot)com._

_I'm doing a collab with Enkida! Check us out under "Seventhe and Enkida" author-name, or search for "How Not to Date Blondes" in the FF8 section. It's probably the most hilarious thing I've ever written. Easily. I cannot sit down and write my share without giggling ridiculously at …something. I'd love to link it, but I know ff-net will eat the link for dinner. You can check my profile, though!_

_Anyway. Again, apologies for the delay, and hopefully I will keep up the momentum on this one and wrap it up. Cheers - Sev_


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